California Governor Sees Easter Too Soon to Emerge From Shutdown

(Bloomberg) -- California Governor Gavin Newsom said that it would be “misleading” to suggest the most populous U.S. state could emerge from the coronavirus shutdown by Easter, as President Donald Trump said may be the case for the rest of the country.

“We’re trying to bend that curve, but we haven’t bent it,” Newsom said during a briefing broadcast live Tuesday on Facebook. “The question is early April, I think that would be misleading to represent at least for California.”

Newsom said that the state is likely looking at a period of eight to 12 weeks of shutdown, based on conversations with experts.

“Soberly we look out over the course of eight to twelve weeks and I think we can continue to do what we’ve done, if we do that, hopefully then we’ll be in a very different place,” he said.

As of 10 A.M. in California, the state had 40 deaths and 2,102 positive cases, the latter of which is up 17.5% from the day before. Newsom said the state is still expecting a surge as thousands of tests results come in.

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