June 26 coronavirus news

Vice President Mike Pence will travel in the coming days to three states hit hardest by a recent surge in coronavirus cases, he announced on Friday.

Pence said he would visit Texas on Sunday alongside Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House coronavirus response coordinator. He said he would travel to Arizona on Tuesday and Florida next Thursday to "get a ground report" in places where coronavirus is rising dramatically.

Pence said he'd spoken to the governors of those three states in the last 12 hours, and announced he would also convene a call with the nation's governors and the White House task force on Monday.

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Vice President Mike Pence said the US's mission right now is to "partner with states to save lives and safely reopen."

The comment comes as more that half of US are reporting an increase in Covid-19 cases in the past week compared to the week before. Today, Florida reported its highest single day of cases since the pandemic began — nearly 9,000, up from about 5,000 the day before.

He added that while the US reopens, officials must take steps to protect Americans.

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In the first public coronavirus task force briefing in nearly two months, Vice President Mike Pence said there are currently "no outstanding requests" from any state at this moment for personal protective equipment, including the hard-hit states in the South.

Pence said the administration is ready "at a moment's notice" to provide supplies as needed.

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Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious diseases expert, is attending today's White House coronavirus task force briefing.

White House coronavirus response coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx and Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar are also on stage at the briefing.

Vice President Mike Pence, who leads the task force, kicked off the briefing by announcing he will travel to Texas, Arizona and Florida next week.

Everyone is wearing masks including Secret Service, except for Pence and his staff. The vice president did have a mask on when he first took the stage, but removed it to speak.

Oklahoma has recorded 395 new Covid-19 cases over the past 24 hours, the state’s Department of Health said Friday.

There is now a total of at least 12,343 cases, including 377 deaths, in the state, according to the agency.

Vice President Mike Pence is holding a public coronavirus task force briefing soon, the first formal public meeting since April 27.

The briefing comes a day after the US saw a record number of new coronavirus cases in a single day with 37,077 reported Thursday, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Thursday's total eclipsed the previous high on April 24, when 36,291 new coronavirus cases were reported across the country.

At least 32 states are seeing an increase in cases of Covid-19, and California, Oklahoma and Texas are seeing fresh high peaks.

The briefing will not take place at the White House, but at the Department of Health and Human Services, according to a schedule released by the White House.

Since Pence was tapped to lead the coronavirus task force on February 27, there have been a total of 47 briefings at the White House, most led by President Trump, and a few led by the vice president.

In recent days, Trump has tried to declare the pandemic "over" despite the rising numbers, and has instead focused his administration's energy on reopening the economy.

According to White House schedule update, Trump is no longer traveling to Bedminster, New Jersey this weekend.

CNN's John King explains where US Covid-19 figures stand now in comparison to the last public task force briefing on April 27:

As Arizona deals with a surge in Covid-19 cases, Tucson has only 10 beds in intensive care units available with a population of about 560,000 people, Mayor Regina Romero said.

Gov. Doug Ducey has put a pause on further reopening the state as the cases spike but Romero criticized his decision through this pandemic, starting with lifting the stay-at-home orders “way too early.”

Romero added that experts say people from the ages of 20 to 44 are most being affected by Covid-19 in Arizona and Pima county, where Tucson is located.

“Those are the people that are actually out, working. Opening back up the state has really affected those workers that have a need to go back to work. And those are, you know, bartenders, waitresses, the people that have to work at their places of business,” she said.

Romero added that the longer it takes to flatten the curve, the lesser consumer confidence they have.

“It was a big mistake by Gov. Ducey to open up the state too soon, because it's still affecting our economy and consumer confidence is down and it's very unfortunate for our economy. It's very unfortunate for the lives of Arizonans," she said.

As the state of Louisiana continues to see a surge in coronavirus cases, Gov. John Bel Edwards said, "We've got some work to do".  

During a Resilient Louisiana Commission meeting on Friday, Edwards said people became complacent because the state was reporting better numbers. The fact is the number of coronavirus cases "aren't getting better, they are getting worse," he said.

The Resilient Louisiana Commission is the group leading coronavirus pandemic strategy.

Edwards said the number of hospitalizations are also rising due to more Covid-19 infections. He said the state isn't anywhere close to not being able to deliver health care, but as cases climb they are heading in that direction.

"What we can not have happen in Louisiana is we threaten our ability to deliver health care," Edwards said. 

Edwards announced this week that the state of Louisiana would remain in phase two of the reopening guidelines due to the spike in cases across the state.

Edwards said there are businesses who he refers to as "bad actors" that are not in compliance with mitigation efforts.

Edwards added that well over 90% of positive cases in the state are coming from community spread especially among people between the age of 18 and 29. Edwards said within this group, those between the age of 18 and 21 are the largest concern because they don't appear to be following any social distancing guidelines. 

On-premise alcohol consumption has been suspended in bars in Florida, according to a tweet from the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation. 

The announcement came the same day the state announced the highest single-day coronavirus case increase of nearly 9,000. 

At least 64 counties in Florida were in phase two of reopening, which allowed restaurants, bars, and other vendors licensed to sell alcoholic beverages, with the exception of nightclubs, to operated bars.

Read the tweet: