Franklincountynow.com Staff Report
(BUZZARDS BAY, MA) — Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker once again used his daily COVID 19 briefing to warn residents of the Commonwealth not to ease up on their social distancing measures as the pandemic continues. Baker spoke to assembled media at Joint Base Cape Cod in Buzzards Bay on Tuesday, and said that there are “difficult days and weeks ahead” as officials continue to prepare for the coronavirus peak to hit the state.
Baker said Massachusetts continues to develop the nation’s largest contact tracing program as part of the effort to re-open the state’s economy.
“Contact tracing and testing will be important,” he said. “We think at the end of the day, testing, tracing, isolation, quarantine — those are big parts of any legitimate effort to reopen.”
Baker said Massachusetts will be working closely with neighboring Northeast states to ensure that the eventual reopening of the economy is done in a way that is timely and safe for Massachusetts.
“We’re going to work collaboratively, but we’re going to do in the end what’s right for Massachusetts,” he said. “Reversing course too soon, opening up before we’re ready and have a plan in place to make sure we can monitor and measure will only make matters worse.”
The Massachusetts Department of Public Health on Tuesday said that there have been 1,296 new cases of the virus, for a total of 28,163 conformed cases. There were 113 new deaths, for a total of 957 since the outbreak hit the state.