IA Gov. Reynolds to stop holding televised coronavirus press conferences

DES MOINES, Iowa (KMTV) — Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds has decided to no longer hold televised press conferences on the coronavirus pandemic.

The governor has gone from holding press conferences Monday through Friday, to just Tuesdays and Thursdays. Now she's going back to what she was doing before the coronavirus hit.

She'll be holding a weekly general press conference and streaming it live on Facebook. Before this announcement, she said Iowa has come a long way with nearly 241,000 Iowans having been tested for coronavirus.

The governor said the positivity rate has dropped from around 30 percent to 10.3 percent today.

Reynolds said hospitalization rates are down with just under 200 people currently hospitalized. For a long time, she has been talking about Iowa’s three phases in tackling the coronavirus pandemic. Those phases are: stabilize, recover and grow.

The governor said Iowa is in the growth phase and she has established an "economic recovery advisory board."

Iowa is reporting seven new deaths for a total of 677. More than 350 more people have tested positive for a total of more than 24,700. A little more than half of those people are listed as recovered.

While the governor is no longer taking questions live on television from the press, the state will soon provide more data on their coronavirus website. It will include things like breakdowns in deaths by county, age, ethnicity and pre-existing conditions.

3 News Now This Morning Anchor Courtney Johns provided live updates via Twitter:

You can find all our coronavirus coverage, including an exposure-site map, here