DOVER, Del. (AP) - The coronavirus epidemic could cost Delaware half a billion dollars, or more than 10 percent of next year’s proposed budget, Gov. John Carney said Tuesday.
Carney referred to the potential economic loss in responding to a question about federal financial assistance related to President Trump’s approval of major disaster declarations for all 50 states.
“For most states and localities, it’s can we use the money for lost revenue,” Carney said. “We could lose a half a billion dollars in revenue with the economy shutdown. That’s 500 million dollars on a 4.6 billion dollar budget. That’s a lot of money.”
The potential loss could become clearer when the panel that sets Delaware’s official revenue projections meets next week.
State officials have delayed income tax filing deadlines because of the virus epidemic, and more than 48,000 Delawareans have filed for unemployment benefits in the past three weeks - five times more than the previous monthly record in January 2020.
Hundreds of Delaware businesses, including restaurants, bars, theaters and fitness centers, have been forced to close or severely restrict operations under an emergency declaration by Carney.
Meanwhile, Delaware’s chief justice on Tuesday extended a ban on public access to all state court facilities for another 30 days. Chief Justice Collins J. Seitz Jr. extended the judicial emergency he had declared on March 14 until May 14. The move came after Carney last week extended the state-of-emergency declaration that he had issued March 12.
As of Tuesday, state public health officials had reported more than 1,920 cases of coronavirus and 43 deaths.
Officials noted last week that they are now reporting deaths not just of people known to have COVID-19, but also “probable” deaths. Those are fatalities in which a person was exposed to a confirmed case and had symptoms consistent with COVID-19, but was never tested.
More than 215 people were hospitalized as of Tuesday for virus-related reasons. That’s less than half the number of hospitalizations that officials had predicted last week. Carney said the projection for hospitalizations by next Monday remains below the surge capacity of Delaware’s hospitals.
“That’s a very good thing. … We’re happy that that’s tracking in a way that is manageable,” said Carney, who noted that the number of cases resulting in hospitalization is less than 12%. Officials had previously predicted a hospitalization rate of up to 20%.
For most people, the new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia, or death. The vast majority of people recover.
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