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Gov. Kate Brown this morning announced new restrictions for nursing homes, senior living facilities and other group homes. Because of the vulnerability of people served in such facilities, Brown is limiting public access of those facilities to medical providers and people who are at the end of their lives.
"Older adults are our most vulnerable population," Brown told reporters on a conference calls. (Oregon's largest outbreak of COVID-19 virus is at Edward C. Allworth Veterans' Home in Lebanon, where 14 residents have been diagnosed.)
Brown also said she is immediately convening a council of business, labor and economic development experts to assess various steps the state might take to ease the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Oregon businesses.
"The goal is to look at tools to provide support to businesses and provide support to workers," Brown said.
An aide to Brown, Christian Gaston, told reporters that there was temporary problem with the Oregon Employment's online portal that allows laid off workers to apply for unemployment benefits. Gaston said that a number of states were uploading large files to a centralized federal database yesterday, causing problems for Oregon, but that the glitch appeared to have been solved.
Gaston said it's too soon to know how many new unemployment claims workers have filed since COVID–19 related layoffs began.
About three-quarters of Oregon's 197 school districts are now preparing meals to students, who are studying at home.
Brown acknowledged the tremendous disruption closures and social distancing measures are causing Oregonians and noted the impacts of COVID-19 are different in different parts of the state.
"It doesn't feel real in Eastern Oregon," Brown said.
The governor nonetheless re-iterated the urgency with which she hopes Oregonians will observe social distancing measures. "I understand these measures extremely difficult," Brown said. "But they are the only way to flatten the curve and slow the rate of infection."
