Kentucky breaks records for new jobs, projects

Alright, everybody it's 4:00 on Monday today, we're going to give a covid update, We're going to give an update on our recovery from especially december's tornadoes and a few other pieces of news. But the most important thing for everyone to here today is that a micron has not only come to the commonwealth, it has hit us harder in terms of escalation of cases than anything we have seen to date. Let's put up the stair stepper chart to begin Last week, 29955 cases. That is twice as many cases as there were reported the week prior. We have never seen an escalation of cases meaning how infectious this virus is. And we are seeing with a macron, we went from being in a relative plateau To the second highest week of reported cases since the start of the pandemic, surpassed only by the week of August 30 when the Delta variant was hitting us at its peak. Today's positivity right Last week's positivity rate, 20.38 was the seven day average. It is 20.72% today, this is the highest since the start of the pandemic for any week or any day, single highest day that we've had was on thursday december the 30th when 6400 41 cases were reported Which surpassed the prior peak of 5742 and I believe that we will see more cases Then last Thursday than 60 400 later in this week because when I go over the cases that we had, especially through the weekend, we believe that there are some reports that haven't come in because of the long holiday weekend and we are likely to see a further escalation from here Due to the volume of COVID-19 cases and the speed at which a micron is spreading. Individuals who test positive or who are exposed, many aren't even contacting their local public health department, meaning that number of cases is probably less. I can tell you is less than the reality. I believe that I've gotten calls from individuals that have tested positive with at home tests that if representative of the rest of the state, there are significantly more cases than this. So those who test positive ought to do three things. Number one, you've got to self isolate when you see this jump, the biggest jump that we have seen week to week by far, it means that if you have a macron and you don't isolate you will infect a ton of people and yes, it appears to be less severe though with the number of cases you're going to see hospitalizations and the rest are going up. But if you can infect a ton of people more people than ever before. In any variant, the odds that you infect someone who is unvaccinated or has preexisting conditions is higher. Given the total number of people you may infect. So you have an absolute duty. If you test positive to follow the procedures to self isolate. Otherwise, you could be causing severe harm To the people around you. # two, you need to notify close contacts. This thing spreads so fast. You need to pick up the phone and call everybody. You have been around recently unless it's happening to a ton of people. So there doesn't need to be any guilt. And I talked to somebody earlier today that I was going to see today that couldn't come in because they tested positive. I hadn't been around them in more than a week. There's no guilt in this, right. This thing is spreading this quickly. We just need you to be willing to call those contacts and to let them know you've tested positive and they need to test themselves and they need to be very careful until they have that test in. And third you need to contact your health care provider if you need medical care and I would urge obviously don't call the emergency room if you're fine. But your regular doctor that you see, if you test positive, I would at least give a call to so that they can monitor you. And so that they are aware, the Department of Public Health has revised guidelines for isolation and quarantine dR stack is going to talk about that in a minute. But if you go back to the original stair step or chart. I mean folks look at this a macron is one of the most infectious, aggressively spreading viruses that we have seen in my lifetime. Certainly in the last 100 years as well. We hope that most people who get it, it will be mild, but for a number it will not. And with that amount of cases we are going to see strain on hospitals. We are going to see more loss of life. And if we can be careful and get more people vaccinated, the protection level is significant. Let's look at our line graph on hospitalizations as you will see. Most certainly now going up, we had the increase the leveling off and just like cases of shot up hospitalizations are going up now. Remember hospitalization trail cases. So this doesn't have this last week's huge number of cases and the amount of individuals who will end up in the hospital. I expect a macron by percentage will have fewer people hospitalized per number of cases. But if there are 68, 10 times as many cases, we can end up with more people hospitalized pretty fast. The other concern is it spread so quickly that it can spread through our healthcare workers uh, in a way that could lessen the amount of capacity that we have. All of that is of concern. I see us going up again. This will trail hospitalizations but going up and ventilators which will trail that generally going up but not nearly as much. I'm not sure what we're gonna see on the ventilator side though. I think it will increase from where it is now, but it's compared to Delta. That'll be something that, that we'll see as we go to break down the numbers on the 30th of december. Our highest case count. Uh, 6441 and 27 deaths from counties all over the commonwealth, people in their fifties. Certainly in that report On New Year's Eve, 5748 new cases. 28 new deaths, Again from people all across the Commonwealth. A number of people in their 50s. A 49 year old woman in Clark County january 1st. And remember, this is reports that came out on New Year's Day. For those that were reporting on New Year's Day, 4359 new cases. 26 new deaths as young as a 42 year old from Montgomery County. The second, 2,767 new cases, that is the reporting lag. It didn't go from 6000 to 2000. That's because of the holiday weekend. 24 new deaths including a 26 year old man from jefferson County. And today, 4,111 new cases. And again, this is the holiday weekend is what we're seeing in every state. It's higher than that. 15 new deaths including a 34 year old woman from Carter County Waning immunity, which we've talked about the need to get a booster is so critical and we'll share some good news in that. But still, even with waning immunity, if we can put the vaccination status up, even with what delta and the rest did, it is 82% plus of all cases, hospitalizations and deaths are unvaccinated individuals. What we're seeing with this one is it appears for most people if you're fully vaccinated and you're boosted you have your immunity up, people are getting it but it is pretty mild and or it is tolerable for those that have not gotten their booster. It hits them a little harder but still for for many people they are able to make it without going into the hospital if they don't have pre existing conditions, macron is hitting those that are unvaccinated hard, just like other ones did in the past. And this is updated through December 29. Even with what we're seeing through a micron and it actually may get better with a micron as as tough as as delta was cases and vaccinations 4.9 times higher likelihood of getting covid if you were unvaccinated than vaccinated. In other words, the cases were unvaccinated in december Almost five times higher. So five unvaccinated individuals getting covid for everyone vaccinated individual. Um Those are our numbers that should have everyone wanted to go out and get their vaccine plus their booster. So vaccines still incredible boosters keep them incredible in terms of protecting yourself. So everybody out there who got their vaccine more than six months ago. And I think it's now down to five. I'll let dr stack talk about that. You really need to get your booster especially now and we are very very close two Kids 12 or maybe even 11 2 15 being eligible for their booster. The FDA has authorized it. It's now back to the C. D. C. For final authorization. There is some indication that the C. D. C. May authorize 11 end up as opposed to just 12 and up. Once this goes through, I will tell you my son has been more than five months since he had his second fighter dose will be taking him to get his booster because we want him protected. We want to keep him in school and it's the right thing to do on the vaccine front. We do continue to see more people getting vaccinated and the pace has picked up at least some 10,383 Kentucky ins getting their first dose over this long weekend, 25,488 getting their booster. So again we need to see more. Um but you know these numbers were 3000 4000 you know three or 4 weeks Amp. So if we break down demographically um Kentucky and vaccinated we're now up to 2,781,123 Kentucky ins that have gotten at least their first shot. That's 62% of every man, woman and child living in the Commonwealth. Even those that don't currently qualify to get a vaccine. Of those that qualify To get the vaccine. 2/3, have gotten at least their first dose. And of those that make their own healthcare decisions. This is up a .74%. Nearly 3/4 of everybody who can make their own decision on whether to get vaccinated have in any other time. This would be the healthcare accomplishment of the century. I mean, getting in one year, 3/4 of everybody 18 and up vaccinated would be nothing short of amazing. But as you see, there were facing our plague. That's what this is. Look at how many people it's taken. I mean, we're gonna approach 13,000 Kentucky ins. What? 820 plus 1000 americans dead. This is what we are facing. Which means we've got to do even better than the best ever. If we want to protect our people better than we have ever seen. So if we break down demographically still 92% of individuals, 75 and up, that means eight people, eight of that demographic is at significant risk. And it's very likely they will get a micron because it's very likely most of us, uh, might get a Macron, Uh,- 74 up a percentage to 96%. These are the all stars of, of getting vaccinated in Kentucky, they've done an incredible job which need them get boosted 50 to 64% to 80%. So look at that, if you are of the demographic 50 and up in Kentucky, At least 80 of every individual in that age group has gotten vaccinated that crosses all types of demographics, party affiliation. You know, there's a lot of noise about some of that stuff. But Remember, I mean 75 People 18 and up Is a huge number. That suggests that the vast majority of people know they need to be doing this to stay safe, 40-49, 25-39, And here's where we've got to get a whole lot better. You know, nationally more kids are going into the hospital than we've ever seen. Kids are being hospitalized at a higher rate. I don't know that we have that data in Kentucky, but if it's happening in other places, it's the same omicron variant. We need to be wary of it too. And we don't have, especially Our young adults or kids vaccinated at nearly a high enough rate. And if we really want to make an impact on that overall 62% number or the two thirds, It's 24 and down that we really desperately need to get more people vaccinated, 53% of 18-24, 49% of 16 to 17 year olds, 12 to 15 45%. And this number 5 to 11 just went up 1% to 17% if we want to keep our kids in school, it's universal masking and increasing uh, that number specifically. So think about it. If you don't have universal masking in an elementary school right now, what you have 83 83% have every student in their unvaccinated. That's gonna make it very, very difficult to continue what I want to see. Which is our kids uh in school with in person learning with that. Let me turn it over to dr stack for a number of updates and then we'll come back and we'll update on tornado relief efforts. Thank you Governor bashir. Good afternoon everyone. So the governor has already shared some of the high points for where we are with a macron right now. Just to emphasize a few of these things. If this weren't causing so much disruption to so many people's lives. It's an absolutely fascinating scientific evolution that this virus is doing. Unfortunately, it causes real tragedy and real harm for people. We had the highest ever single daily record number of cases last week on the 30th. I believe we have the highest ever positivity rate for the entire pandemic. And remember positivity rate is the number of positive tests divided by the total number of tests, we have 100 well over 100,000 tests a day being done pcr alone and many, many more antigen tests on top of that. So we have way more testing than we did before. And we had a positivity rate lower When we were only able to test less than 100 people a day. I mean, this is really striking how much this virus has spread. Um, the hospitalization numbers are also increasing as the governor said, thankfully not quite as quickly and there is some reason it still seems to be hopeful that a macron maybe a little more mild, but if a micron reaches a peak that's half again or twice as high as the previous peak, there'll be plenty of people who are sick enough to need hospitalization and unfortunately will be predominantly unvaccinated folks who have no protection probably against the virus. So the situation is fluid and changing quickly, which leads to a number of the items that I'm going to update you on right now. So the CDC recently, as many of you are probably aware, updated its isolation and quarantine guidance. Now I'm sympathetic to the CDC because everyone is trying their best to calibrate the interventions to keep people safe to keep people at work and yet minimize the spread of the disease. So that the health care system, which really quite frankly is teetering in some places doesn't have even more strain and I'll come back to that. So I'm gonna say three explicit populations if you're in the healthcare setting. So if you run a hospital, a doctor's office, a nursing home, you should follow the December 23 CDC guidance. That's called the interim guidance for managing healthcare personnel with infection or exposure to SARS COV two. This was released just before christmas and it was intended to give hospitals a little bit more leeway so that they could not have to do a lot of steps to get down this path, but a little more leeway so that they could make sure they had staff available to take care of patients in need. The CDC quickly then came and followed up with another set of guidance, which was for the general public. Now, this caused a little bit more difficulty. Their goal was trying to make sure that business didn't come to a halt, that airlines could still fly that people could get where they needed to go and other businesses could operate. That guidance is a little more permissive than the healthcare setting. And they say that that is intentional because they want to make sure that hospitals still are among the safest places you can go to get care. So you should still feel very confident that all the hospitals in Kentucky are going to keep you safe and do the best they can to make sure you have a uneventful course during your stay there. If you have to go in the hospital, the third audience other than the general public Is K through 12 schools and the governor teed this up very nicely just before I came up here in schools, the Children are still largely unvaccinated and their ability to comply with mask use is properly as it needs to be done is just not as good as it needs to be, particularly when they go in cafeterias and other places because they have to eat and drink and you don't set a six year old or an eight year old all by themselves in the corner just to eat. It's not like an adult who can maybe go outside and eating their car if they have to go on a break. So the school situation is different and the CDC has not yet revised those guidances. So I'm gonna walk through just a couple of slides here real quick and then I'll build up to the school situation. So if you can show my first slide please. So this is the test for isolation. This is if you test positive, what should you do? And there's some key numbers, you should remember. The default in virtually all of these is 10 days. If you test positive, if you get exposed, you should generally isolate or quarantine for 10 days, the CDC allowed a number of ways you could shorten that or get out of that a little bit earlier. So on this slide, if your symptoms fully resolved. So you say you have a little sniffles on day one and two, you get a test your positive and by day €5 or six, your symptoms fully resolved. You can shorten the isolation period to as short as five days. But under all circumstances, you should stay home, stay away from school, stay away from other people until you are past the five day mark. Even if all your symptoms resolve. But even there, the CDC says for 10 days, you should wear a well fitting mask for the full 10 days and I'm going to come back to that In every one of these scenarios, the CDC says you should wear a well fitting mask for the full 10 day period, even if you get out of isolation or quarantine earlier. And that's really important because I know there's a lot of fun. I don't like wearing a mask either, but a lot of folks just don't want to wear a mask. I think folks who are finished with discussing the evidence, the evidence is overwhelming. The masks slow the transmission of the disease. They don't do it perfectly, but they do it very well. So everybody needs to wear a mask for the full 10 days of isolation or quarantine. But you could go back to work if you have no symptoms and just wear a mask for the last five days. That's a big deal that helps get you back to work sooner. It helps keep businesses open. If you've tested for positive for Covid and you've never had symptoms. Then after five days wearing a mask for five more days, you can go back to work. All right. So that's on this slide, which will have on our website, I believe. And I'm sure there's reporters who have taken pictures of it already. So if we go on to the next slide, please, this is for quarantine. This is where your vaccination status starts to impact this year. If you are not fully vaccinated or you are eligible for a booster but have not gotten your booster yet. You should quarantine for 10 days after your last exposure. And here too. You could shorten it to five days if you have no symptoms, which means you haven't shown that you have the illness yet and you get a negative test on day five or later. So the CDC used to have a version that was a week long. They shorten this to five days. So if you have no symptoms, even if you're not vaccinated and you get a negative test on day five, you can go back to work as long as you wear a mask. Well fitting mask for the next five days, if you are boosted and um, or fully vaccinate your, I'm sorry if you're fully vaccinated within six months of your second dose or fully vaccinated and boosted. So you're six months after your second dose of your vaccine, you don't have to quarantine at all. But they still recommend you get a test after five days and you should still wear a mask in every scenario because a macron spread so rapidly and so effectively people are urged to wear a mask. So next slide I'm not going to dwell on this as much this, this is going to be posted as well. There's more to it on the bottom and we'll try to reformat it so it's appropriate for social media. But there's a one page infographic that will talk about this, the 10, 5, 10 About 10 days of isolation or five days if you're asymptomatic for isolation and just tested positive for 10 days for quarantine. And then underneath it will tell you the ways you can get that to be shorter on that infographic. So we'll have that posted on the website here today. Next slide please James actually hold on for one second on this one. So I'm gonna talk real quick on therapeutics and then hand it back over to the governor. So um on the on the vaccines, everybody who has gotten the vaccine should get a booster. If you're two months or more after J and J. Or if you're six months or more after your second um Fighter or Moderna and I'll clarify for the governor and I have the FDA is press release so that the FDA recommended 12 and up for boosters and now the CDC will review that and almost certainly will approve it. And then everyone 12 and older will be eligible for a fighter booster and everyone who is 18 and over would be eligible for a Moderna or a J and J booster. So I urge you to get vaccinated hands down. It is the single most powerful medication tool. We have to minimize the harm of this disease. And I'm going to talk about monoclonal antibodies. So unfortunately two of the three monoclonal antibodies that are FDA authorized for covid 19 in the United States. So Regen Cov and bam Bte and that shortened for the longer chemical names. These two are ineffective against the omicron variant And when the proportion of variance goes up above 80% uh, the guidance is that we should not use those because it's unlikely to help someone. So there's no justification to expose someone to the risk. However small it is when there's no likely benefit and we're pretty much at that point now. So predominantly We feel that the evidence and again it's imprecise, but we believe that we're at that 80% threshold. So sites are able to use up what little of these two medications they have if they're seeing people still benefit. But there are no more shipments coming into Kentucky as of today. And so there will not be any more regen cov or bam et This means these really effective treatments are going to hardly be available because there's only one remaining that works. Petrova MIB and Petrova MIB or sort of a mob rather. We're only going to get Um, probably less than 20% of what we would need to meet the demand. So folks, please go to our website, you can see where the monoclonal sites are. You can call and ask if they have access to monoclonal, but if they don't, it's not their fault. It's not our fault really. No one's fault. There's just none available because a macron made the two most commonly available ones ineffective. I bet the scientists will come up with more but it'll take a little time before we get that particularly now because we've lost those monoclonal. Those vaccines are just so important because the vaccines do work against a micron and all the evidence still supports that they're keeping people out of the hospital and out of the ICU. So please consider getting vaccinated. Now the next slide James the oral antivirals, there's two of these, there's the Merc pill appear appear mon appear. Beer is now available in Kentucky at least on a very limited basis for today. So today was the first day it was available. Um Walgreens was the chain pharmacy that the federal government identified for the vaccine project that had the best geographic footprint for us to be able to use for the vaccines. So Walgreens we reached out to and they have worked with us on this and we're grateful to them. We only got 3300 doses of Multan appear appear for the first allocation And wall and it's complicated. There's specific inclusion and exclusion criteria. So we started with 10 locations with Walgreens, most of those are around the major highways and we put two down in the tornado affected areas so that folks down there had access to it. So They will have 550 doses per store. And when they're gone they're gone. And so it'll be two more weeks before they get another shipment. But that is where it will start. This will go live on the website today by 5:00 today. It'll have the name of the store, it's street address. And then you can go to the Walgreens website. If you want more information About two weeks from now, this will extend to about 52 sites and that will be throughout the entire state and every area development district will have at least one site in it. So that will expand. But if we get 3300 doses that means there's just gonna be a lot more per store. So folks please be patient with these people at the pharmacy. Theyre just gonna try to do the best they can to administer this to the people who are eligible. You will need a prescription from your doctor or other prescriber only physicians, nurse practitioners and physician assistants can prescribe this uh for the federal government And there are a number of things, you have to be over 18, you can't be pregnant, you can't be trying to get pregnant And if you're a man, you are encouraged to use birth control for at least three months after you use the medication because of some of its characteristics. And I'll leave the details for that for another time. Um, the final one, you can take that down James and there's no more slides is packs a little bit. That's the fighter pill. The fighter pill doesn't have as many restrictions and it appears to be a little bit more effective. Actually, a lot more effective, maybe 80, some percent effective in minimizing the risk of progression to severe disease. This one, we only got 720 doses, folks. The governor just stood up here and told you, what do we have? Like over 20,000 new cases last week, We only got 720 doses. You don't have to do advanced math to know there's not enough to go around because it is so limited. We are gonna just, we've distributed and they won't get it until tomorrow or Wednesday to just a handful of federally qualified health care centers, some long term care or nursing home pharmacies to try to ensure it gets to the most vulnerable the most at risk for severe disease or hospitalization and and helps those most in need. And so that's what we'll do for the first couple of distribution cycles. The federal government has said to the states that the production is not likely to substantially increase until spring. So it's gonna could be a wonderful drug, but it's gonna take more time to get enough of it before people can just go take a prescription and get it filled. My final remarks here are that um Al Macron shows that Covid is not done with us, no matter how much we want to be done with Covid. Um but January 2022 is not the same as January 2021. If you get vaccinated and you follow a few simple pieces of guidance, your likelihood of getting severely hurt from omicron or any other variants that we know of is extraordinarily unlikely, but that's if you get vaccinated. Um, so I would urge you to please get vaccinated and then there's only a few other simple rules. Stay home if you're sick. If you've got a fever, a cough, a sore throat, The sniffles, it doesn't make a difference what type of infection it is, folks don't go out and spread it. Nobody needs to have any doubt what kind of infection they have now don't go out and spread it. So stay home, wear a mask a well fitted mask. If you're at any indoor settings with other people folks, I know we don't like these. Okay, But this can be done. I think the kids show how well it can be done. The kids forget they have it on, they tolerate it just fine. It's us adults who get more frustrated with it than the kids. So please wear a mask And then get tested. If you think you have COVID-19 I know that's going to be hard. There's so many people trying to get tested now. It's hard to get it. That's because too many people have this disease and then this leads to the final thing. I forgot to say about the schools. We gotta have our kids in school folks. We all know it's a priority. We all share. This is not rural or urban or democrat or Republican. We all know we need to have our kids in school and we're all committed to that. It is absolutely imperative that they take advantage of the test to stay program we set up, we've got 105 counties. Using that program, we've done over a half million tests since the start of the school year. We have a good test to stay program that the schools can use second. They've got to wear these masks. All right. I'm telling you if you open a school this week and you're not requiring masks, you're going to affect the whole building in the first two weeks. I mean it's going to happen that fast. This viruses like measles measles the most contagious known viral infection on the planet earth for a very long time. And the only comparison that we can make for a micron that seems even remotely a proposed is that it's like measles. So folks, I urge you if you're running a school require masks when they come back to school after this New year's break. Use the test to stay program and please we're gonna keep our regular guidance up that we had before because if you use test to stay plus masks, no kid needs to miss school unless they actually have an infection and then they shouldn't be in school because we can't afford to have covid spreading around other folks. We can get through this, we can only get through it together. But I'm still convinced we're gonna get through this together and I thank you for joining us along the way and working with us to get through it. Thanks. Alright. A few quick updates on tornado relief efforts and then we'll get to questions that I know will likely be on a macron Today. I've asked the president to extend the 100% federal cost share for cleanup of the massive effort required to restore our western Kentucky communities impacted by the deadly tornadoes that took 77 Kentucky ins including 14 Children. We are so thankful for the quick action and all the actions today from the president from homeland security and from fema. We got an immediate emergency declaration then a major disaster declaration. Then on December 14 while he was in Kentucky, The president provided that 100 Coverage for a 30 day period. Our challenge is as we close in on that 30th day Justin debris removal alone, we're probably at the 3% mark of what needs to be done. The Army Corps of Engineers estimates that it will be the end of april before they complete their mission. The cost of which is over $100 million. So the need here is significant And our request will be an additional 60 days At 100% federal cost share is an unprecedented request. I'm asking for something that almost no one's asked for before. But this is an unprecedented disaster. Even those that have been in female for decades walking around Mayfield or walking around Dawson Springs would look not just at us but each other and say this is different. The level of devastation and and the the amount of work that's going to be required to just get us to a build back point is so significant. We need the assistance. If the 25% cost shares initiated, the cost to about 16 impacted counties would be about $67 million, possibly even more than that. Most recent storms over the new year's holiday indicates substantial impacts to homes, commercial properties, water distribution centers, roads and bridges as well. And many of these happened in these same counties. Unfortunately, another disaster declaration request may be forthcoming. But given everything we're facing, we really need that additional 100% federal share and we will advise what we hear back. Okay. Um, On December 28, I signed an executive order to temporarily suspend the work search requirement in the waiting week period for UI and disaster unemployment assistance claimants impacted by the tornadoes. I'm happy to report that the United States Department of Labor has approved that request. This means that claimants that are unemployed due to the tornadoes That work or live in the 16 counties that are included in the major disaster declaration can get benefits almost immediately. Once approved, this will not include claims starting on December. This will include claims starting on December 10 but only in the 16 counties. Under the disaster declaration here, updated locations for this week's unemployment insurance, d'You a clinics in person clinics designed to give people the help they need. They are Tuesday through Thursday January four. They are through the sixth from eight a.m. To 4:30 p.m. In Bowling green there to 62 Scots ville Road and it may feel their 3 51 Charles drive. It's not necessary to attend the in person session, but we've learned over the last 20 two months that you really want to go to these because it is a difficult system. You are likely to make a mistake without going to one of these and it may impact your ability to qualify for these benefits. The deadline to apply is January 18, 2022. Baron and Baron and Marion counties have a little bit longer january 27th 2022 you can go to K. C. C dot ky dot gov for updated information. Uh disaster snap benefits, which is additional food assistance that we've worked hard to make available. Have been approved by the US Department of Agriculture. Food and nutrition service for Kentucky ins who live and work in 14 of the counties impacted by the tornadoes. The disaster snap benefits were approved december 30th for short term food help for individuals and families living in caldwell, christian, Fulton Graves heart, Hickman, Hopkins, Logan, lion Marshall, Muhlenberg, Ohio taylor and warren counties Kentucky ins residing or working in barren and Marion counties will have an opportunity at a later date. What this does is give food assistance to low income households with food loss, loss of income or damage caused by a natural disaster approved beneficiaries will receive an electronic benefit card as the E. B. T. Card. The card is used just like a debit card to buy food at most local grocery stores because of the unique needs of disaster survivors. There are some different standards for disaster or d snap than the regular snap program. You may qualify for d snap if you had one of the disaster related expenses below home or business repairs, temporary shelter experience expenses, evacuation or relocation expenses, home or business protection, disaster related personal injury lost or no access to income due to the disaster. In some cases, food loss after a disaster like flooding or power outages. So we would encourage everybody who has run into any of these issues and we're working directly with local leadership to apply. Um You can call d snap at 18333718570. That is the fastest applications are taken by phone eight a.m. To 5:30 p.m. Monday through friday. And on saturday nine a.m. To two p.m. Applications can also be made at the D. C. B. S. Offices in these counties in Graves County. You can go to the purchase area development district office and we've established an additional site in Dawson Springs at the outward facility. Residents who currently receive snap benefits can replace request and reply and apply for a replacement of benefits Due to power outages and other impacts, replacement requests must be made by January 10 again. For those you can call the regular de CBS number 8553068959. And finally let's end today. The opposite of how we began, which is concerning, let's end with exciting. You know, when we look at 2021, it's a year of great difficulty. The pandemic taking so many lives, natural disasters book ending uh that year. Yeah, more opportunity, More potential prosperity created in 2021 than in any year in my lifetime. We have now closed the books On 2021 and I can confirm that we broke every economic development record that we have ever tracked Last year. More than 260 companies announced over $11.2 billion 18,100 full time jobs in the coming years. Both of those total investment and the jobs all time state records its economic growth unlike anything we have ever seen before. And they were at the second highest hourly wage that we have seen in any year in our history of economic development. More jobs and rising wages means real opportunity. And in my state of the commonwealth coming up later this week, we're gonna talk about how exciting these opportunities are that they are occurring in every part of the commonwealth, not just in a couple of cities and these are jobs of the future and everything from electric vehicles, two recycled paper mills to agriculture technology to space. We are truly attracting the types of jobs that are gonna be here in 30 to 40 years and more major companies are betting on us with their biggest projects ever than ever before. Just think about it, we are now home to the largest projects ever in the history of ford and amazon of pratt which is now a half billion dollar facility and this year we had the single largest announcement in our history with the Blue oval sk Battery Park in Hardin County. Nearly $5.8 billion. 5000 new jobs, this is ford and sK betting their future on us and we're not gonna let them down. It was Toyota investing another nearly half a billion dollars because they believe in us to compete in electric vehicles right here in Kentucky. I just shined a light on the importance of manufacturing where we've now proven that we can do things in Kentucky that people thought couldn't be done in the United States. Look at GE in Louisville with two announced expansions this year, making refrigerators which nobody thought could be brought back to the United States and continuing to grow and to add jobs, food and beverage, agro tech, metals, logistics distributions. I gotta tell you while we've got a pandemic that we've got to beat and we will beat it. And while we have seen natural disasters that ferocity of which I can't explain, I do know that if we can get through the darkness that are those challenges, the light that is ahead of us is greater than I have ever seen and the future of this commonwealth is brighter than many of us imagined it could ever be. So stick with us. We will make it, we will get through these challenges sadly, we're gonna lose more people before we do. But what's waiting on the other side is as special as we are, as a people, we are good people that look out for one another and we deserve a good future and we've got one coming up final plug state of the commonwealth. This Wednesday at seven p.m. We're gonna talk about the year that was and what's to come. We'll give a little preview of the budget address which is coming up. It's our chance to turn to years of great economic progress into 20 years of incredible prosperity for our people. But we will have more resources to make wise investments to make sure that we are never a flyover state ever again. We are the destination. I think that's our destiny and now is our time to grab it. So with that we'll open it up to questions first to those. We have um here in uh studio. Karen's are school districts in the country have already announced that because of their numbers, they're going to have to start virtual Others of course have the mask mandate. If you still have the power not only mask mandates, but are there any other safety mandates that you would issue not only for school but for businesses based on today's numbers. So if I still had the authority to do so, masking would be required in every Kentucky school because no school is gonna make it without doing it. If you look at the numbers that we have seen and you heard dr stacks expert opinion, they're not gonna make it two weeks without infecting the entire building. And maybe it's less than that. When you look at our vaccine numbers which I'm really proud of the part that we're not cutting. It that we haven't done enough is our kids that would be in school where at least half of them are not vaccinated. And now we have the uh the most aggressively spreading variant that we have seen. Um we look at some other things as well about if you've had it testing and and what it will take right now its guidance. Um certainly we would look at at making that requirement. But I think schools are all following that and then we talk with the districts themselves about other needs that they have. Certainly the amount of testing that is available to them is very helpful right now. Um encourage, I would encourage every school district first of all to do universal masking but second do another round of vaccine clinics that just give people the option, especially with what we're seeing right now, as long as parents agree, give kids the option to get a vaccine any day that they're in school. Once the parents say yes, let's make sure that we can get that done businesses, we have talks with the business community. Um I as the ceo of the executive branch of state government, I'm going to continue to require masking in our places of work that is both to protect the health of our people but it is also to protect our workforce. We do very important things that from bridge inspections right, making sure that people are safe crossing them uh to to driver's licenses to building inspections so many to processing unemployment claims to our, our focus on the transportation cabinet that are cleaning the roads in these hard hit areas. This is a variant that can wipe out your workforce for a period of time very quickly and I as the ceo of my workforce um I think that a mask is a very small uh but very effective step to preserve that workforce. Tom Thank you governor. Good afternoon. Um Speaking of the workforce, have you had any issues with state government staffing due to covid and especially the new on the crime? And have there been any covid outbreaks in the tornado area? The church. So I was down in Mayfield today and at least um one of the first responder groups have started seeing cases of a micron. I wouldn't call it an outbreak because it it doesn't hit their entire uh workforce but are already seeing less personnel for public services. We've had people that we've been advised have tested positive sure that work in state government but we haven't seen any specific units that have gotten hit incredibly hard since we went two mandatory masking in our workplace. We haven't had one major outbreak and that's when there have been major outbreaks. It, other employers that that have not required. We continue to urge vaccinations amongst our workforce. I think we could do better and will continue to push to do better. Austin. Thank you Governor, the session coming republicans say they're going to file a bill filing deadline back assuming that aligned with the north. So I haven't had the first conversation on moving the deadline other than the speaker told me that they would file a bill to to do it and I told him that I would take a look at it but I would want to have a conversation with them. I also want to see the redistricting plan that I think will be filed at the same time. So I don't think one decision is made in a vacuum without the other piece. I've seen the overall House maps that I think everybody else has. But without the precinct level data it's hard to have an analysis there. We haven't seen the Senate maps or the congressional maps or the Supreme Court maps. So that'll be a wait and see and even once they're filed it'll probably take a couple of days to get our arms around it. Bye. Thank you. When Cornell University started experimenting during the isolation period. Thanks october they stipulated that fully vaccinated. Good isolated. Perfect. What do you think the Cds I had to test out requirements Better to go. So the C. D. C. The question is on the C. D. C. Guidance and and using an example from Cornell. Um I want to be a supportive of the C. D. C. As I can they are trying but the level of communication I believe with either our state public health officials or governors has decreased over time. We would have liked to have had more input. We would have liked to have done more analysis. I'm not sure we agree with every piece that is on it and we certainly have some concerns that I believe are now being expressed nationally. Yeah, again, I believe that the CDC is trying to do their best. I believe that they're trying to balance a number of things. I would have appreciated more collaboration on, I mean both dr stack and I have been fighting this pandemic for longer than the current leadership of of some of these organizations um have been in their offices, we respect them, we like working with them, but there are things that we would have done differently. Once the CDC puts it out, it's hard to do it differently. And again, that might be analyzed as not being supportive. We'd just like to see something different moving into the future. So when, when people leave isolation, if they have been positive, they certainly need to test negative in my opinion at least once. I would, if it were me or my family, I want to test negative at least twice and we already wear masks, but I would continue to wear a mask for a period after that because if I get covid I'm probably going to be okay minus a few small underlying conditions. My worry is always, it's been about my family and my friends, the citizens and people around me. And so my biggest concern coming out of isolation would be the potential to infect other people. Uh I would also uh I want to do a piece of full pcr test if it were me. Um as opposed to just a rapid test. You want to add anything dr stack? I was giving my personal opinion. You don't have to give yours. Yeah. Okay, good. Um Grayson, we lost. Okay. Uh we'll go to who we have virtually unless we have rick Schobel, nope. Okay scotty. Virtually. Where where do we start? W. V. L. T. Karen Boyer. We're getting closer to the end by the minute of the press conference. Corrine, are you there just having trouble coming through? Let's try. Debby Yetter. All right. While we wait any follow ups. So, the question is thoughts on the redistricting maps. You know, I don't like to I don't like to have emotional responses to something like this. I like to see the the underlying data. Um you know, being somebody that lived in Jefferson County for 15 years. I have some concerns about that map seems to be. Uh and and what it does also possibly Lexington. Now there are some things that I've seen that I think could be a positive, you know, Hopkins County is its own district and there hasn't been a representative that lives in Hopkins County Uh for many years. Uh they they I think they have five different districts went into to Hopkins County. So I want to see more before ultimately making a final decision. I want to make sure that they are fair and that with, you know, 75 members already From one party, they weren't drawn in a way to, to, let's say intentionally try to move to an even larger majority than that as opposed to create proper districts. Yes. So right now the team Kentucky Fund, team western Kentucky Tornado Relief Fund was constructed for the December 10 tornadoes. We'd have to make an alteration in executive order or, or maybe even ultimately regulation to include others. But it's a lot of the same counties and sometimes even the same families that are impacted governor with some kids being able to use the fighter. Hmm, They had moderna fully vaccinated or johnson and johnson and they still get the fire. So most kids were only eligible for fighter when it opened up. So, you know, every, every kid that's still under that age group would have gotten fighter and then still needs to get a fighter. I had a couple of issues, a couple of questions that were sent in. Am I planning to provide my state of the commonwealth address in person in the chambers as of today? Yes. Now we just saw the jump in a macron cases. So I'm at least going to reserve the ability to try to do the right thing. if the right thing changes. Uh, second, howard national supply chain issues an increased price of construction materials affecting the rebuilding and repair efforts in western Kentucky. I think that that's probably an issue that we're going to face in the coming weeks right now. We're still in more of the cleanup phase and we've got everybody else back. Corinne Boyer. Hi, governor, can you hear me? Okay. Um, many news outlets are reporting that Al Macron is expected to peak in about mid january. Um, is there an estimated peak that it might, is there a date that it might peak in Kentucky? Well, we certainly think it would be later than places that it started faster. So if you look at a place that's suggesting that one way to do it is look how many weeks earlier they started the escalation that we're going through now. But, but I do believe that it's not going to be uniform everywhere. There's gonna be things like vaccination rates, how hard potentially we got hit by delta. We don't know how, how much that will respond. So I think each area is going to be unique and I think it's our job to do everything we can to make it peak as early as we can by getting vaccinated and wearing masks? Debby Yetter hi, I think I'm here this time. Um, did you have any more thoughts about the redistricting maps in particular what they do to some of the counties and some of the legislators who will be hard to run against each other. For example, in jefferson County, I'm trying to reserve judgment until we can get the electronic files, see precincts really get a better understanding. I am, I am concerned at the outset about what appears to have happened in jefferson and Fayette counties. Alternatively, I mentioned Hopkins County will have if, if that part of the map goes through the first representative that has lived in Hopkins County. Uh, and, and I think at least six years also still want more information on what's been done to to Frankfurt And others, you know, at a time when one party has 75 of 100 seats. I just really like to see some fair maps. I think once you have that type of supermajority, trying to, to draw maps to where you can have three or four or five more. Not, not the right thing to do. And I think it has a risk of backfiring once you, once you reach that stage, could you, uh, unintentionally create more districts where, where they are more competitive and attempt to do the opposite. I certainly think that the risk there, if that's what you're trying to do increases april record. Hi, thank you how much a micron is showing up in Kentucky samples so far and what do you expect with covid deaths in the coming weeks based on other states. So we think we think everything is on Macron by this point. And if it's not, it is substantially all I don't have our most recent analysis. More Dr Stack says it's 80% or more of of what we're seeing, but it's here and it's going to be everything by next week. If it's not already hard to predict deaths, hard to know how deadly this one is. And the different factors are, seems to cause less severe illness vaccines still hold up. It appears for preventing severe illness boosters even better and they are readily available. And we got hit pretty hard with Delta. People hopefully will be wearing masks more often now that we are seeing this and we have an uptick in vaccinations. I think all of those factors are going to be what determines it. Again, I'm also were concerned not just about deaths from covid, but if we see too much hospitalization at the same time, we're seeing the workforce decrease because healthcare workers are getting um, Akron then we risk having preventable deaths for things like car accidents and strokes and heart attacks where we would otherwise be able to provide significant treatment to folks. But if we're spread too. Mm hmm, mm hmm

Gov. Beshear: Kentucky breaks records for new jobs, projects

Updated: 4:26 PM EST Jan 4, 2022

Kentucky broke records for investment and job creation in 2021, Gov. Andy Beshear said on Monday, Jan. 3.Last year, 264 private-sector projects committed to invest over $11.2 billion and create over 18,100 full-time jobs. This includes a decision by Ford Motor Co. and its battery partner to build twin battery plants in Glendale, Kentucky. Beshear called it the "single largest economic development project in the state's history" and said it will create 5,000 jobs.Wages have risen as well. Kentucky's average incentivized hourly wage for projects statewide in 2021 was $24 before benefits, a 9.4% increase over 2020 and the second highest mark of the past seven years.

Kentucky broke records for investment and job creation in 2021, Gov. Andy Beshear said on Monday, Jan. 3.

Last year, 264 private-sector projects committed to invest over $11.2 billion and create over 18,100 full-time jobs. This includes a decision by Ford Motor Co. and its battery partner to build twin battery plants in Glendale, Kentucky.

Beshear called it the "single largest economic development project in the state's history" and said it will create 5,000 jobs.

Wages have risen as well. Kentucky's average incentivized hourly wage for projects statewide in 2021 was $24 before benefits, a 9.4% increase over 2020 and the second highest mark of the past seven years.