Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D)’s office announced Monday that he is self-quarantining for an “appropriate isolation period” after a staff member tested positive for the Chinese coronavirus.
The development comes after Pritzker once again tested negative for the deadly virus. The Illinois Democrat will now hold his daily virus briefings via video conferences. Last week, Pritzker released a five-part plan to reopen businesses and institutions in the state. The plan divides the state into four regions – northeast, north-central, central, and southern Illinois – and each area can open independently through the five phases as businesses, institutions, and recreational activities restart operations. The state entered phase two of the plan on May 1, marking the beginning of a modified stay-at-home order.
On Sunday, Pritzker once against attacked the Trump administration, claiming it has failed to deliver on numerous promises.
“I have not been counting on the White House because there have been too many situations in which they’ve made promises not delivered,” he told CNN host Jake Tapper. “Very recently, they promised a lot of swabs. They’re supposed to arrive today, the first shipment of those. I’m looking forward to that. But what we’re doing is we’re going it alone, as the White House has left all the states to do. And we’ve done well, spinning up testing. We will continue to grow our testing. We have the ability to do that on our own. And we’ve had contact tracing across the state. We have county health departments that do that. We have our state health department, which does that.”
As of Monday, Illinois has over 77,700 confirmed coronavirus cases and at least 3,400 deaths, according to the state’s public health department. The United States has 1.37 million cases and 80,652 fatalities, while 211,000 have recovered, reports John Hopkins University.