All Valley counties moving to ‘yellow’ phase next Friday
All of the Valley moving to yellow phase next week
HARRISBURG – Our Valley is going yellow…Governor Tom Wolf says 24 Pennsylvania counties in the northwest and north central regions will be moving from the ‘red’ to ‘yellow’ phase next Friday, May 8, including The Valley.
Governor Wolf announced Friday, Northumberland, Union, Snyder and Montour counties will move to the ‘yellow’ phase next Friday at 12:01 a.m., “We selected these counties in part because they have low per capita case counts. They were selected in part because we feel we’re ready when it comes to activities like contract tracing and testing, and they were selected in part because of a variety of other factors provided by our epidemiologists and experts such as population density.” Columbia County will stay ‘red.’
The governor says this coming Monday, he’ll release more information for businesses which will be permitted to reopen next Friday, and that will include government offices. These businesses won’t include places like hair and nail salons, and barbers, due to social distancing matters. The state has also listed work and congregate setting restrictions and social restrictions, those are posted below.
Work & Congregate Setting Restrictions
• Telework Must Continue Where Feasible
• Businesses with In-Person Operations Must Follow Business and Building Safety Orders
• Child Care Open Complying with Guidance
• Congregate Care and Prison Restrictions in Place
• Schools Remain Closed for In-Person Instruction
Social Restrictions
• Stay at Home Order Lifted for Aggressive Mitigation
• Large Gatherings of More than 25 Prohibited
• In-Person Retail Allowable, Curbside and Delivery Preferable
• Indoor Recreation, Health and Wellness Facilities and Personal Care Services (such as gyms, spas, hair salons, nail salons and other entities that provide massage therapy), and all Entertainment (such as casinos, theaters) Remain Closed
• Restaurants and Bars Limited to Carry-Out and Delivery Only
Governor Wolf says all Pennsylvanians need to take personal responsibility for their actions or yellow counties could get moved back to red, “We’ll need stores to use no-contact options, like curbside pickup and delivery as much as possible. We’ll need businesses to continue allowing workers to telework as much as possible, and we’ll need Pennsylvanians to continue to stay physically stay away from one another as much as possible.”
Governor Wolf says all other counties in red are still under the stay-at-home order, but he says counties in southwest and southcentral PA are now under consideration to move to yellow.
For counties in yellow, Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine says there will be a lot more ‘contract tracing,’ “First, we receive a report of a positive test result in our electronic data surveillance system, then our community health nurses contact the patient and do a full case investigation, and they determine with whom they may have come into contact while they might have been infectious.”
Dr. Levine says the department would then contact anyone who may have come in contact with positive patients, and those people would be subject to 14-day quarantine. Dr. Levine says probable positive COVID-19 cases in this case would also be treated in the same way.
You can hear Friday’s entire announcement here.
