In recent news conferences, Governor Laura Kelly has mentioned her plans for rolling out a new unified testing strategy and a larger mitigation plan update as soon as the middle of next week. Part of that new mitigation plan — at least the funding and the tentative timeline — were actually approved during the State Finance Council meeting Friday.
The Finance Council set aside $1.5 million in CARES Act funds for a 10-week PSA campaign that will be on radio, TV and print and could be rolled out before Thanksgiving. The Council had already approved $95 million for testing, including $45 million two weeks ago, as part of a new unified strategy with the goal of providing up to 1 million tests by the end of the year.
Governor Kelly says the goal is to slow down the recent COVID-19 spike through mitigation, not by shutting down businesses across the state.
Just in Lyon County, there have been around 500 new cases since late October and the active caseload jumped by almost 400 over that time. Other counties across Kansas are seeing similar spikes in activity and the state is now adding upwards of 5,000 cases every two days, according to the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.
Kelly instituted an aggressive plan in April which included travel restrictions, a mask mandate and business shutdowns depending on available space and other criteria. Republicans objected and the Ad Astra recovery plan went from mandatory to advisory in June.
