Governor Bill Lee's Daily COVID-19 Update April 20

Record Testing Conducted This Weekend

In an aggressive push to test outside of traditional symptoms, Gov. Lee announced that more than 11,000 Tennesseans received free COVID-19 tests through the weekend efforts of the Unified-Command Group. Expanded testing will continue for the next two weekends - April 25-26 and May 2-3. The list of sites for this coming weekend will be forthcoming.

In addition to drive-through sites, all rural county health departments across the state offer free COVID-19 testing 5 days a week. A full list of county health departments can be accessed here.

To date, we have conducted 100,689 tests, with this weekend's surge accounting for the largest number of tests conducted in our state over a two-day period.

More information on Tennessee's expanded testing capacity is available here.

Data Update

• For 17 consecutive days, we have seen only single digit percentage increases in the number of cases in our state;
• Our hospitalization rate has consistently remained lower than national averages;
• As of today, our number of recovered patients exceeds the number of active cases.

Safer at Home Expiring April 30, Phased Reopening Next Week

Today, Gov. Lee announced the order for Tennesseans to remain at home will expire April 30, 2020. The vast majority of businesses in 89 of Tennessee's 95 counties will be allowed to re-open on May 1, with some slated to open on Monday, April 27.

The Economic Recovery Group (ERG), composed of 30 leaders from the public and private sector is crafting guidance to assist businesses in a safe reopening. The industry representatives participating in the ERG collectively represent over 140,000 Tennessee businesses that employ over 2.5M Tennesseans.

The Lee Administration is working directly with local officials and health departments in Tennessee's major metropolitan areas (Shelby, Madison, Davidson, Hamilton, Knox and Sullivan counties) as they plan their re-open strategies.

More information on efforts to safely reboot Tennessee's economy is available here, and more information about the Economic Recovery Group is available here.