Coronavirus Latest: White House Designates Baltimore-DC Corridor As Emerging Hot Spot For Coronavirus, Hogan Says
BALTIMORE (WJZ) -- Gov. Larry Hogan says he has convinced the Trump administration to recognize the Baltimore-Washington, D.C. corridor as an "emerging hotspot for COVID-19 cases.
"We have succeeded in convincing the Trump administration to designate BW corridor as a priority," Hogan said at a press conference at the Baltimore Convention Center on Tuesday.
He said he had been "sounding the alarm" to the federal administration for the last two weeks, and the entire state of Maryland will be flagged to the White House as well as Baltimore City, Anne Arundel, Calvert, Carroll, Charles, Frederick, Harford, Howard, Montgomery, Prince George's and Queen Anne's counties.
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The Baltimore-D.C. corridor is home to hundreds of thousands of federal workers, and Hogan argued that the area has had a rising number of cases.
Governor Hogan says Maryland needs rapid and expanded testing before the state can return to normal. That is not here yet. #coronavirus
— Mike Hellgren (@HellgrenWJZ) April 7, 2020
He added there are now nearly 9,000 cases in the Maryland, Virginia, and DC area, and 189 people in the region have died in the last 24 days.
There are 4,371 cases of coronavirus in Maryland, according to numbers released by the state Tuesday morning, and 103 have died from COVID-19.
For the latest information on coronavirus go to the Maryland Health Department's website or call 211. You can find all of WJZ's coverage on coronavirus in Maryland here.