Beginning April 27th time-sensitive elective medical procedures will be permitted under the state’s coronavirus social distancing guidelines. Matt Doyle has more.

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Rev. Tony Spell surrenders and is in the custody of law enforcement after Central Police issue a warrant for his arrest.  The warrant comes after Spell nearly hit a protestor with a church bus.  The preacher leads the Life Tabernacle Church who continues to violate the Governor’s stay at home order during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Louisiana House GOP Leader Blake Miguez says Louisiana needs to reopen its economy on a parish by parish basis, but Governor Edwards disagrees.  Miguez wrote a letter to the Governor calling on him to implement Phase One of the federal reopening plan after the stay-at-home order ends April 30^th.
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Phase One allows for limited reopening like dine-in restaurants while calling for sustained social distancing and use of public PPE.  Edwards says he’s leaning towards issuing any guidance at a state level.

Nasal swabs for COVID-19 testing are now being 3-D printed at LSU Health Shreveport. The swabs, which are a crucial part or the testing kit, have been in short supply.  Molecular and cellular physiology professor Dr. Steven Alexander says the light-activated printing technique can produce medical devices which are chemically inert, sterile, and compatible with accurate testing procedures.

Cut 6 (07) “…to existing swabs.”

Many Louisiana residents are anxious to see if the governor will begin to re-open parts of the economy on May 1st. His current stay at home order expires April 30th. Governor Edwards says he will use certain benchmarks, one being that Louisiana has the capacity to test 140-to-150-thousand people a month…
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Edwards says there also needs to be a two-week window where there is a downward trajectory in the numbers of people with COVID-19 symptoms.

The state department of education has found all 69 school districts are offering continuous education, even though schools are closed. D-O-E spokesperson Sydni Dunn…
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Dunn says their survey found about 32-percent of school systems are connecting with students every day, but 28-percent of students do not have access to a computer.

Louisiana’s COVID-19 death toll has reached 1,328 and that includes the head warden and medical director at the Raymond Laborde Correctional Center in Avoyelles Parish. Corrections officials say Sandy McCain served as head warden for the past four years and battled COVID-19 for nearly a month. The center’s medical director Doctor Casey McVea also passed away.

In northwest Louisiana, 3-D printing is helping to increase the number of COVID-19 tests…
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House Republican Caucus Chairman Blake Miguez has asked the governor to reopen the state’s economy on a parish-by-parish basis, starting on May 1st. Miguez says a long-term statewide shutdown is not sustainable…
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But Governor Edwards says a re-opening of the economy will occur once the state meets certain thresholds that the White House has laid out. He says Louisiana needs to have a two-week window where there is a downward trajectory in the numbers of people with COVID-19 symptoms, which includes known cases and hospitalizations…
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The governor’s current stay at home order lasts until April 30th.

LSU Health Shreveport is using a 3D printer to produce nasal swabs for its COVID-19 testing lab. Molecular and cellular physiology professor Doctor Steven Alexander says the goal is to produce about a thousand swabs a day…
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Doctor Alexander says once they produce enough for their own lab, they plan to share with other hospitals in their area.

The state department of education has conducted a survey that has found all 69 school districts are offering some level of continuous education. But state department of education spokesperson Sydni Dunn says they also found 28-percent of students do not have access to a computer and one out of four students are also not getting feedback on the work they are doing…
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Chairman of Louisiana’s House delegation Blake Miguez is encouraging Governor John Bel Edwards to reopen businesses on May 1st under the guidelines provided by the White House…
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But Edwards says the state has yet to meet the thresholds under White House guidelines that would allow him to re-open businesses after the current stay at home order expires April 30th.

But the Governor is revising his order so that starting on Monday surgical procedures can resume to treat an emergency or time-sensitive medical condition. A surgery can also take place to avoid an underlying health condition from getting worse. But State Health Officer Doctor Jimmy Guidry says not every procedure will be deemed necessary…
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The state Department of Education releases a survey that finds all 69 public school districts are offering some level of distance education while campuses are closed. But D-O-E spokesperson Sydni Dunn says…
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The study found that many students and teachers do not have the right technology to maximize learning, 28-percent of students do not have access to a computer.

LSU Health Shreveport is using a three-d printer to produce nasal swabs for COVID-19 test. Molecular and cellular physiology professor Dr. Steven Alexander hopes the extra swab availability will lead to testing of individuals who are not showing any symptoms
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Alexander hopes they’ll be able to produce a thousand nasal swabs a day by the end of the week.

Louisiana will allow elective medical procedures to resume next Monday. State Health Officer Doctor Jimmy Guidry says this order covers surgeries that could keep medical conditions from getting worse…
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Guidry says the state is reviewing what this order will mean for abortions.

The state department of education has found that all 69 school district is offering continuous education, even though schools are closed. D-O-E spokesperson Sydni Dunn…
cut 8 (12) “…other online platforms”
Dunn says their survey found about 32-percent of school systems are connecting with students every day, but 28-percent of students do not have access to a computer.

The Louisiana House GOP Leader and Governor disagree on just how the state should begin to reopen in May. Matt Doyle has the story.
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Louisiana reports a slight increase in the total number of COVID-19 hospitalizations today for the first time since April 13^th, and 32 more Louisianans are also reported to have died from COVID-19. To date 24,523 cases have been reported and 1,328 fatalities. 56 percent of the fatalities are African Americans, who make up just a third of the population.

The coronavirus economic collapse and an international price war lead to a historic collapse in oil prices…

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A Main Street America survey shows nearly 60-percent of small businesses in the state are in danger of closing permanently due to COVID-19 in the next six months. Lt. Governor Billy Nungesser is a co-chairman of the Resilient Louisiana Commission which will make recommendations on how to reopen the state’s economy…

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The US Supreme Court rules all felony trials must be decided by a unanimous jury verdict in a 6-3 ruling of a case brought by Evangelisto Ramos, who was found guilty of killing a woman in New Orleans in 2014 on a 10-2 vote that he appealed on constitutional grounds. The decision will likely result in some high-profile retrials of people on direct review. Loyola University Law Professor Dane Ciolino says one of those will likely be for Ronald Glasser who was convicted of murdering NFL running back Joe McKnight in 2016.

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For the first time ever, West Texas Intermediate oil futures traded in the negative today.  Louisiana Oil and Gas Association President Gifford Briggs says the industry is facing a crisis, with many Louisiana wells planning to shut in 100% of their production due to storage constraints as companies are being told they can’t take delivery in May.

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Ten years ago today the BP Oil Spill killed 11 rig workers and coated much of the state’s coastline in tar. Congressman Garrett Graves was the head of the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority at the time. Louisiana received just over eight billion dollars in settlement funds to help restore the coast and billions more in economic damages as a result.

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The spill pumped 4.9 million barrels of oil into the Gulf.

A Main Street America survey shows nearly 60-percent of small businesses in the state are in danger of closing permanently due to COVID-19 in the next six months. Lt. Governor Billy Nungesser encourages Louisianans to have a staycation when they can venture out again and to visit a part of the state they’ve never been to and support the local economy.

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The US Supreme Court rules all felony trials must be decided by a unanimous jury verdict, a decision likely to result in dozens of retrials in Louisiana. There are likely hundreds of people incarcerated in Louisiana due to non-unanimous verdicts whose cases are decided and whose appeals are done. Loyola University Law Professor Dane Ciolino says for them…

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