West Virginia Governor Jim Justice reiterated on Wednesday during his COVID-19 response press conference that the state needs more people tested.

 

"We have got to test to stop this dreaded disease," Justice said. "We need to test children, as well as adults, as well as anybody feeling sick. It is absolutely imparitive to test everyone we have got to test."

 

He said it's simple, the more testing, the more information the health experts have to work with as well as the possibility for a county to get into a safer color zone.

 

The governor used Kanawha County as an example where he said they have been testing on average of 400 people per day and that number needs to increase significantly to help the county out of the orange, red levels (Kanawha has fluttered between the two highest-risk colors on the warning map the past couple of days).

 

Justice said he realizes that a problem with ramped up testing is having enough resources including local county health officials to help administer the tests. He said that help is on the way in that department as plans are under way to put more National Guard members into the field as well as increased help from the DHHR.

 

"We have got to make it easier to get tested, not more difficullt," Justice said. "Somehow, we have to do more."

 

Private Schools in the state will soon be able to have in-person learning even if their county is orange because of an agreement those schools have made.

 

"The private schools have agreed to do something novel," Justice said. "They have agreed to test everyone."

 

Turning his attention to Monongalia County, the governor said he believed they were trending in the right direction and could possibly be in the gold or yellow soon. 

 

He also addressed the recent news that bar owners in Mon County are suing the state.

 

"Now we have been sued by the bar owners and they have the right to do so," Justice said. "Rigt off the get-go I proposed a plan where they could open with certain guidelines and they rejected that."

 

Justice also said that the state's RT number continues to go back down and is currenty the 22nd worst in the nation. He added that there are currently 34 outbreaks associated with long term facilities and four outbreaks in churches. Mt. Olive Correctional Facility is down to seven active cases.

 

The governor said it would try to have some level of guidellines by Oct. 1 for Halloween activities such as trick-or-treating.

 

Upcoming testing events will be held this week in Boone, Cabell, Jackson, Logan, Marion, Mingo, Monongalia, Putnam, Summers, Wayne, and Wyoming counties. For more testing locations, please visit https://dhhr.wv.gov/COVID-19/pages/testing.aspx.