New COVID-19 Health Orders Coming In Ohio

COLUMBUS, OH — During the opening of an Ohio State University COVID-19 vaccination clinic, Gov. Mike DeWine revealed he would announce new COVID-19 health orders.

Over the past three weeks, Ohio has seen a slight uptick in new COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations. DeWine said COVID-19 variants are driving the spike in new cases. More than 300 cases of the U.K. COVID-19 variant have been found in Ohio, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"We are concerned about that. What we need to do to stay on defense is emphasize the basics," DeWine said.

What are the basics? Wearing a mask, washing your hands regularly, maintaining social distance when in public, and gathering outdoors rather than indoors, whenever possible, DeWine said. To reinforce the importance of COVID-19 safety protocols, DeWine said he would issue new health orders on Monday.

"As we put new orders out today, we'll simplify and make it really basic," the governor said on Monday. "People are tired. They've been at this for a year. This needs to be simple. Masks really, really, really work."

Guidance for proms and graduations should also be released Monday, DeWine said.

He added that Ohio officials will continue to ramp up the vaccination program. In the past week, approximately 620,000 Ohioans received the first part of the two-part COVID-19 vaccine, DeWine said.

"That's powerful. We want to continue to do that," DeWine said. "It is a month or two where we have a lot going on as we vaccinate more and more people. The past seven days we've had a good run of vaccinating people."