See second story below. (Andrew Mills | NJ Advance Media)SL
By Brent Johnson | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
Two months after announcing the state’s first case, officials Tuesday said the death toll from the coronavirus in New Jersey has increased to at least 8,244 with at least 130,593 total cases, as residents and businesses remain under near-lockdown to slow the spread of the virus.
The numbers include 334 new deaths attributed to COVID-19 and 2,494 new positive tests in the Garden State, which remains the U.S. state with the second most coronavirus cases and deaths after New York.
“It is unfathomable,” Gov. Phil Murphy said of the death toll. He noted there is still some lag in the reporting of the cases from the weekend and that the numbers don’t reflect those who died in the last 24 hours.
Hospitalizations for confirmed or suspected coronavirus cases – a number Murphy has made a key benchmark to start lifting social distancing restrictions and closures – have continued to drop in New Jersey.
As of 10 p.m. Monday, there were 5,328 coronavirus patients across New Jersey’s 71 hospitals, according to the state’s figures. That is the lowest number in more than a month and a 36% drop from a peak of 8,293 on April 14.
“We have avoided the worst of it by a lot,” Murphy said. “Let’s keep at it, because our vigilance is working, it’s paying off and it needs to keep paying off.”
Of the patients hospitalized Monday night, 1,534 were in critical or intensive care and 1,169 were on ventilators. That latter is the lowest number of patients on ventilators since April 4, when the state started publicly tracking those figures. Officials said 232 coronavirus patients were discharged between Sunday and Monday night. That does not include patients who died.
The state’s number of cases is cumulative and does not include the likely thousands who have recovered from COVID-19, officials say. It’s hard to get an exact figure for how much the virus is spread in New Jersey because of gaps in testing and lags in results.
Related news story:
Schools in N.J. will stay closed
By Matt Arco | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com and Adam Clark | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
New Jersey schools will remain closed for the rest of this academic year as the state continues its battle against the coronavirus pandemic, Gov. Phil Murphy announced Monday.
The governor tweeted he will extend the statewide school closure throughout the rest of the academic year. The state’s schools will continue teaching about 1.4 million public school students from home.
The order also applies to private schools with longer school years, he said. They must remain closed until at least June 30.
“We reach this conclusion based on the guidance from our public health experts and with a single goal in mind, the safety and well-being of our children and our educators,” Murphy said Monday during his daily briefing on the pandemic.
“This has been an inclusive and rigorous process involving people with a wide range of experiences and perspectives,” he said. “I had hoped we could get back to a sense of normal by allowing our children to return to the schools they love, and to be with their friends and classmates. But, the reality is that we cannot safely reopen our schools to provide students and families, or faculty and staff, the confidence needed to allow for a return to in-person instruction.”
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