The Iowa Department of Public Health reports two new, COVID-19 deaths over the past 24-hours (11-a.m. Thursday to 11-a.m. Friday). Governor Kim Reynolds updated the statistics during her press conference this (Friday) morning:

• 118 new COVID-19 positive cases, for a total of 1,388.
• Two new counties have their first cases of the virus: Osceola and Union. Total number of affected counties: 81.
• 862 negative test results, for a total of 14,565.
• 119 patients with the virus are hospitalized, 506 have recovered (36%), 2 new deaths are reported: an older adult and and elderly adult, both in Linn County.

According to IDPH, the locations and age ranges of the 118 (NEW) individuals with COVID-19 include:

• Allamakee County, 1 middle-age adult (41-60)
• Black Hawk County, 6 adults (18-40 years), 7 middle-age adults (41-60 years), 1 older adult (61-80 years)
• Cedar County, 1 adult (18-40 years)
• Clarke County, 1 middle-age adult (41-60 years)
• Clayton County, 1 adult (18-40 years)
• Clinton County, 2 middle-age adults (41-60 years), 1 older adult (61-80 years)
• Dubuque County, 1 middle-age adult (41-60 years)
• Fayette County, 1 middle-age adult (41-60 years)
• Harrison County, 1 older adult (61-80 years)
• Henry County, 1 adult (18-40 years), 1 older adult (61-80 years)
• Jasper County, 1 adult (18-40 years)
• Johnson County, 1 child (0-17 years), 5 adults (18-40 years), 6 middle-age adults (41-60 years), 2 older adults (61-80 years)
• Linn County, 3 adults (18-40 years), 4 middle-age adults (41-60 years), 2 older adults (61-80 years), 1 elderly adult (81+)
• Louisa County, 5 adults (18-40 years), 6 middle-age adults (41-60 years), 3 older adults (61-80 years)
• Marshall County, 2 adults (41-60 years)
• Muscatine County, 2 adults (18-40 years), 8 middle-age adults (41-60 years), 1 older adult (61-80 years)
• Osceola County, 1 middle-age adult (41-60 years)
• Polk County, 6 adults (18-40 years), 1 older adult (61-80 years)
• Pottawattamie County, 1 middle-age adult (41-60 years)
• Scott County, 3 adults (18-40 years), 6 middle-age adults (41-60 years), 1 older adult (61-80 years, 1 elderly adult (81+)
• Tama County, 4 adults (18-40 years), 3 middle-age adults (41-60 years)
• Union County, 1 older adult (61-80 years)
• Wapello County, 1 adult (18-40 years)
• Warren County, 1 adult (18-40 years), 1 middle-age adult (41-60 years)
• Washington County, 2 adults (18-40 years), 2 middle-age adults (41-60 years), 1 older adult (61-80 years)
• Winnebago County, 1 adult (18-40 years)
• Woodbury County, 3 middle-age adults (41-60 years)

The Governor also touched on the fact that 354,000 Iowans are Food Insecure. Those families may now be faced with the recent loss of jobs, children out of school, and [having] trouble making ends meet. “Iowa’s six Feeding America Food Banks and their 1,200 community partners across the State, provided 38-million meals to Iowans in need last year. And while [the] COVID-19 pandemic is unlike anything we’ve ever experienced, we remain committed to feeding even more Iowa families during these challenging times.”

Last month, she said, Iowa Food Pantries helped 65% more Iowans with applications for food assistance than the same time last year. “But as the number of food insecure Iowans increases, so does demand on our food banks and pantries.”  She said Lt. Governor Adam Gregg has been put in charge of a “Feeding Iowans Task Force,” established to raise awareness of hunger related issues, identifying potential gaps in the system connecting resources to ensure that Iowans have food on their tables, and making sure Iowans know where to go, to get help.”)
If you’re in immediate need of food, Reynolds says “Please go to your nearest food bank, food pantry or to cornonavirus.iowa.gov for food assistance information.” She said also, those same facilities are in need of volunteers. Go to volunteeriowa.org to find out where you can lend a hand.

OMAHA, NE –FBI Omaha Field Office Special Agent in Charge Kristi K. Johnson is encouraging parents, students and teachers to take advantage of the FBI’s Safe Online Surfing program; a free, fun and educational program for children. The goals of FBI’s Safe Online Surfing (SOS) Internet Challenge program are to teach children in third through eighth grades how to recognize and respond to online dangers such as cyberbullying, online predators, and identity thieves.

The SOS program teaches young people about web terminology and how to recognize secure and trustworthy sites. Other lessons cover how to protect personal details online, create strong passwords, avoid viruses and scams, be wary of strangers and be a good virtual citizen. Students and their parents can visit the island that corresponds with their grade level and surf through activities that teach how to recognize hazards and respond appropriately.

The SOS program is designed to meet all federal and state Internet safety mandates so that students and teachers can use this as part of their curriculum in the classroom. Schools can compete with each other on a national level and schools with the highest scores will earn an FBI-SOS certificate. More than 1 million students completed the program and took the SOS exam during the 2018-2019 school year. SOS activities are available to everyone, but teachers must register for a class to participate in the tests and competition. Any public, private or home school in the United States with at least five students is eligible for the online challenge. Teachers manage their students’ participation in the program and the FBI does not collect or store any student information.

Since October 2012, the FBI-SOS website has been visited nearly 3.6 million times, with a total of more than 10.6 million page views. Parents, students, and teachers can visit https://sos.fbi.gov/en/ to register.

Here is the video feed for Governor Reynolds’ Friday press briefing. We will have live audio as well on KJAN at approximately 11:00 a.m.

WATERLOO, Iowa (AP) — A business services company in Waterloo has laid off dozens of workers after the coronavirus pandemic upended its recent expansion. VGM Group announced this week that it has eliminated 58 full-time jobs and 15 part-time jobs. The employee-owned company said that it had offered transfers, extended furloughs or early retirement packages to another 17 workers. VGM Group provides purchasing, insurance, health care management, marketing and other services to thousands of business customers across North America.

VGM CEO Mike Mallaro says the cuts are “very difficult for everyone in the VGM family” but necessary.

(Radio Iowa) — It will likely take a year or more to replace two medical marijuana dispensaries in eastern and western Iowa. Dispensaries in Council Bluffs and Davenport closed without notice on March 30th. The manager of the Iowa Department of Public Health’s medical cannabis program, Owen Parker, says the licenses of the closed dispensaries operated by the Have a Heart company are no longer valid.  “There’s no management agreement where transfers or anything like that that can be done. The licenses, once they’re closed, are rescinded. It just starts from scratch however many licenses need to be filled,” Parker says.

Parker says Have A Heart ignored the rules of their contract and failed to give six months’ notice. He says if the company had given proper notice — the re-opening process could have been faster. Parker says the license application process will be underway soon.  “And then we will award the license to somebody which then is when they would move forward with their buildout, so from beginning to end you can’t really put an exact timetable on it, it’s easy to say a year or more in all reality, ” according to Parker.

Patients in eastern Iowa will have to get their medical marijuana products from the remaining dispensaries in Sioux City, Waterloo, or Des Moines.