VIDEO: "We are in a Bad Place," Says Raimondo as Infection Spirals in RI
GoLocalProv News Team
VIDEO: "We are in a Bad Place," Says Raimondo as Infection Spirals in RI
Governor Gina Raimondo said at her weekly press briefing, “We are at a bad place.”
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLASTAccording to Covid Act Now, Rhode Island has the most infection of any state on the entire East Coast.
Rhode Island continues to have the 6th highest number of deaths per 100,000 in the United States.
There are virtually no infections at the colleges — combined the schools tested 5,840 on Tuesday and had only 7 positive tests.
The rest of Rhode Island, however, is seeing an explosion of positive cases.
Excluding the college testing, Rhode Island only conducted 7,557 tests.
Not including the college numbers, Rhode Island had 418 new positive cases — thus the “real infection rate” is 5.57% and that may be undercounted as the state is lumping asymptomatic and symptomatic testing results together.
Overall, the state reported 499 total new cases including catch up tests -- total new cases for recorded Tuesday was 425.
Raimondo Warns
"[This is] not a good news story — we’re in a bad place, heading in the wrong direction in every metric. It's more than a wake-up call. Ask yourself, what am I going to do differently," said Raimondo on Wednesday. "Yesterday we had a percent positive of 3.2% and four more deaths. The million test mark was a huge milestone. We were the first state in the country to test the equivalent of our population — Rhode Island continues to lead the nation in our testing."
"All the arrows are pointing up — over the past four weeks it’s been doubling. Too many cases, too many hospitalizations," she said.
Time to Adjust Behavior
Raimondo said during her briefing, "We all need to adjust our behavior — the vast majority of you are doing your level best to follow the rules. The truth of it is all of us have let our guard down..and that is clearly reflected in our data."
"It’s very clear the increase is coming from casual gatherings with family and friends in setting where are guard is down and masks are off," she added. "We’re all starting to spend time with too many people. For a long time I said keep your circle small. Now we’re extending our contacts, we’re taking our masks off, and we’re not in a great place."
"Take out a piece of paper and write down the names of the few people you’re going to see in the next couple of weeks — who you live with, your family, a few coworkers — that’s it. We have to keep our groups small and stable. We need to turn around this trend," said Raimondo.
"Limit your interactions to people that you need to see - the people you live with, the kids who sit around you in class, you need to see your coworkers — and try very hard to stay within that closed circle," said Raimondo who has not canceled Halloween.
"You don’t need to watch a sports game or sports practice, or go out for coffee after church, have friends over for dinner or lunch, go out and hang out with coworkers after work, three play dates in a weekend. We just don’t have the luxury to be doing that now in the next couple of weeks. If you find yourself in a setting with people you don’t live with — please put your mask on. Mask wearing is one of the simplest things we can do," said Raimondo.