Alabama health officer discusses spike in coronavirus cases, precautions for Thanksgiving

Alabama health officer discusses spike in coronavirus cases, precautions for Thanksgiving

The last ever thanksgiving for someone in your family like your parents or your grandparents.

That was state health officer dr. scott harris today with a warning about what could happen in alabama this thankgiving if we ignore coronavirus guidelines.

Health officials are stressing how important it is to stop the spread of coronavirus cases.

We are seeing the most rapid increase of positive cases in the state since the pandemic started.

Waay 31's sydney martin is live in huntsville tonight with their message to the community- dan, najahe- today, state health officer scott harris spotlighted the rate in which people are dying from this pandemic in alabama.

The death rate is 1 point 5 percent, but that's 15 times greater than the rate with the flu-- and he said it's more important now than ever that we take the virus seriously.

With thanksgiving this week- health officials stressed following c-d-c recommendations about trying to limit people who you eat with that are not in your immediate household.

If possible, choose either eating outside or having seperate tables for people who live in different households.

Since a lot of families normally have buffets of food, this year- health officials are asking for only one person to serve food for everyone..

And for everyone at your gathering to stay in their mask until it's time to eat..

Although it's different than everyone is used to listen to the fears of state health officials if these guidelines are not practiced and folowed: dr. scott harris, state health officer "particularly like when prevention of disease is so preventable if we can only do the things we are supposed to do.

What kind of thankgiving we have is going to go a long way to determine what december looks like, what's our holiday season going to look like, and what kind of numbers are we going to be seeing then."

"we want you to remember this is one thanksgiving hopefully out of many to come and that we may have to make some changes and should make changes for this holiday season but that is to allow us to have many more in the future."

Now today- health officials said they're asking for anyone who chooses to travel for thanksgiving to be smart about it.

By wearing their mask, sanitizing and trying to stay separate -- to make sure you don't unknowingly expose your family or loved ones at high risk to the virus if you have it and aren't showing symptoms. live in huntsville sm waay31 news.