N.J. Has Highest Virus Rate of Big States Despite Case Drop
N.J. Has Highest Virus Rate Among Biggest States, Governor Says
(Bloomberg) -- New Jersey leads the largest U.S. states in the number of Covid-19 cases per 100,000 people, even as it saw the fewest diagnoses in more than six weeks, Governor Phil Murphy said.
With 17 new cases for every 100,000 residents, the state has a higher rate of infection than New York, California or Texas, Murphy said during a news briefing in Trenton. New Jersey is the “most impacted state in America,” Murphy said. “We are not out of the woods yet.”
The state’s virus-related death toll reached 9,508 while the number of cases rose by 898 to 140,743, he said, the fewest new cases since March 25.
Murphy said New Jersey will likely open businesses and workplaces statewide, rather than in regional blocs. But he declined to give target dates on reopening, saying those plans are still gelling.
“There’s not going to be one magic date when everything opens,” Murphy said. The approach, he said, “will be a series of incremental steps.”
Deborah Birx, the White House coronavirus task force response coordinator, recommended in a telephone call Tuesday that all long-term care residents and staff be tested, according to New Jersey Health Commissioner Judith Persichilli.
New Jersey will do so by May 26, Murphy announced.
“We need to have an even more robust testing program that is ingrained in our communities,” Murphy said. Mobile teams will go directly to hot spots and vulnerable neighborhoods, he said.
The state now has as many as 900 contact tracers and plans to hire 1,000 more -- a key to reopening, he said.
As New Jersey starts to open, social distancing will be even more important, Murphy said. By month’s end, New Jersey has the goal of testing 20,000 people per day. At the end of April, he said, the daily rate was 12,000, double that of a month earlier.
In a Rutgers-Eagleton Poll released Tuesday, 66% of New Jerseyans said the state is moving at the right pace to reopen businesses, while 19% said too quickly and 16% said too slowly. One-third said the state will return to normal by July 1, and 25% said it won’t happen by year’s end. The poll, of 1,502 adults from April 22-May 2, has an error margin of 3 percentage points.
New Jersey, where coronavirus gripped New York City suburbs before spreading south, has shown slow but steady progress on containment. At times last month, almost all intensive- and critical-care patients were on ventilators. On Tuesday, 75% of such patients were relying on the machines.
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