Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds will speak to Iowans in a broadcast address tonight at 6:05 p.m. It’s believed to be the first time an Iowa governor has made such an address. News/Talk 1540 KXEL will carry the remarks live. The governor’s office says she will “announce new steps to fight the virus in order to protect lives, livelihoods, hospital resources and health care workers.”
The Iowa Department of Public Health’s COVID-19 data is showing an increase of 2,335 confirmed cases of the virus from 10:00 a.m. on November 15 to 10:00 a.m. on November 16. Those new cases come from 5,400 new tests for a daily positivity rate of 43.2%. Six new deaths were reported over the last 24-hour stretch – meaning 1,991 Iowans have died from COVID-19 during the pandemic.
The biggest reason coronavirus infections are soaring in the Midwest isn’t because residents don’t understand the dangers of the virus or how to protect themselves. It’s because many of them aren’t that concerned. In much of the region, as in other pockets of the country, some look at statistics showing that most people quickly recover from the virus and ask, why should I stop living my life the way I want to avoid catching an illness that probably won’t hurt me much anyway? The perception, coupled with a lack of government mandates requiring masks and other safety precautions, is a huge concern for local public health officials. They worry that soaring caseloads will soon overwhelm their hospitals.
The mother of a missing 10-year-old Iowa girl joined other supporters in a march Saturday to raise community awareness of her disappearance. Breasia Terrell of Davenport was reported missing July 10 after going to spend the previous night at an apartment with her half-brother and his father, 47-year-old Henry Dinkins. The Quad-City Times reports that girl’s mother, Aishia Lankford, held a poster filled with photos of herself and her daughter during the march. Police have not made any arrests related to Terrell’s disappearance.
Former U.S. Sen. Roger Jepsen who represented Iowa in Washington D.C. in the early 1980s has died. The 91-year-old Republican died Friday at a hospice facility in Bettendorf, Iowa. U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley said Jepsen served the state well during his single term in the Senate from 1979 to 1985. While in Congress, Jepsen led the Joint Economic Committee of Congress and served on the Armed Services and Agriculture committees. After losing his re-election bid to Democrat Tom Harkin, Jepsen was appointed chairman of the National Credit Union Administration Board and helped oversee more than 14,000 credit unions nationwide from 1985 until 1993.
