during the covid-19 crisis. we received news today that for the first time that we know of, somebody tested positive that

was sleeping behind me. for the past four weeks, the five of us as supervisors and the executive director of the coalition on homelessness has been talking to the department of public health, to the department of human services, to the mayor's office, and saying, from a common sense perspective and from a health perspective. we need to house in hotels, in some of the 30,000 plus hotels that are sitting empty as we speak, people experiencing homelessness, if they can take care of themselves in the hotel. if they don't need supervision 24 hours a day. we have the hotel rooms. we have the money. we have the staffing why wouldn't we do this right now and save thousands of lives?

for four woks e -- for four wee behind the scenes we have been advocating to do what is common sense and we have been given every reason in the book that's not possible. and we are here to say, it's possible and we are not going to tke no for an answer. this morning, we demanded that every one from the shelter who has been exposed to covid-19 be housed in a hotel room if they can take care of themselves. we were told that is not going to happen. that they will move people that were sleeping closest to the individual, but that they were not even ready to move 60-year-olds or people with serious underlying health conditions. we know that there are at least 75 individuals, who are over 60 or have serious unlying health conditions that have been guest in the division circle hotel and

most moved today. the supervisor will share with you a conversation that he with the mayor, it appears that they are going to move individuals that are older or have health conditions by the end of the day. but not everybody in the navigation center and we are here to say, it's simply unacceptable. this is my district. that navigation center sits in my district and i will fight to get every one of the residents like all of my constituents inside sheltering in place and safe. once again, we have the hotel rooms. we have the money, we have the staffing. we can fight for more money from the feds if we can't pay for it all at once. why are we not doing what makes sense and saving lives by housing every single homeless individual who can shelter in place and self care.

there's no reason and no excuse why we cannot do it. i will now turn it over to the executive director -- >> will you spell your name for us? hilary ronen, i am the supervisor of district nine where we are standing right now. >> did you call the press conference? >> we called us collectively. the five us supervisors. myself, aaron, shaman and dean preston we have been fighting and making the demand for the past four weeks, we think we have gotten somewhere and we move way backwards. we think we got somewhere and we move way backwards. so we are now taking the fight public. and we will explain all of the steps that we are going to do to could do it and we are going to introduce emergency legislation that my colleagues will talk about shortly. first, we will introduce the executive director of coalition on homelessness.

all right, and you are listening to a news conference and it's happening in san francisco, about a person testing positive in a division circle navigation center and they are talking about hopefully moving people who are in the center and at risk of pe -- risks contracting covid-19 to hotels. they say the hotel rooms are there so they can move those people to shelter in place. we will continue to monitor that and have the latest info on abc7 news.com. for now, we will take a

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92% of this country right now under stay-at-home orders and we really need to have a unified, unified rule to shelter in place and again, like we mentioned, we are not sure in the curve is flattened yet, the best thing we can do is prepare for the fact that it may extend well passed may. there's had models that say, we are going to see cases going through june and july. the best thing we can do is we have tools we have tools to mitigate and we can make sure that we are all working on it together, regardless of how long it goes. >> next question, can you talk about any new symptoms that you are seeing, i have seen people talking about possibly gi symptoms before everything else hits. there's a lot of reports coming out about kind of a-typical symptoms. your classic triad will be what people are talking about. dry cough, fever, shortness of breath. there's reports of patients

presenting with just stomach symptoms. nausea, loss of appetite and diarrhea, the receptor that the virus uses, it's on the outside of cells, it's also found in your stomach, on your blood vessels and parts of your central nervous system. we have seen patients in literature that presented with diarrhea and things like confusion, headache, strokes. what it tell us, we have to keep a broad lens out, and that was another question. what are the rare symptoms, and if diarrhea is a symptom, and it sounds like they can be. but that is more rare. along with the headaches and things like that. >> so far, it's telling us to e again, just keep a very open mind. when we see the patients. one other symptom which is not necessarily rare, it's being reported a lot. the loss of smell or taste. now, there's an app, a covid-19

symptom tracker app, where people can report symptoms and it had a large amount of people, according to a new york times article, a report having a loss of smell or taste. again, we are learning more and more as the weeks go on. >> yeah, and in fact, our co-worker who's wife tested positive, she mentioned that as being one of the first symptoms. we touched on this briefly, when can we have more testing kits. we need more kits, right? >> yeah, yet, i don't know if we have a specific date that we are going to be able to say, hey, now we have more tests. it depends where in the supply chain we are talking about. about a month ago, we were talking about issues with the chemicals needed to run the tests and that was when governor newsome said, this is like getting a printer with no ink cartridge. now companies are starting to step up. we have a national backlog of the tests, one thing that is

popeful, the fda just approved a new test. different than what we were using in the past. a antibody test, so, hopefully that will also contribute to what we are doing right now, and just trying to get more screening out there, and trying to figure out, if somebody has covid-19, if somebody doesn't. if somebody is improving. etcetera. >> all right will, good to know. so, coco wants to know, can you catch the virus from packages in the mail? great question, coco, so, we have mentioned before, that we suspect the virus can live on cardboard for about a day, now, if you think about the mail, that is likely traveling to different distances, not really going to live that long. on paper. and also, when in doubt, always just wash your hands. now, one thing that we should always remember f there's a bit of virus on something. that doesn't necessarily mean that it will be enough to cause a rapid infection. we cannot say otherwise. when in doubt, wash your hands,

it's safe to get your mail. >> we may be able to get one in before the next break. how do essential businesses do symptom checks? businesses are being strict. about screening our employees and making sure that they have no recent symptoms. travel exposures, etcetera. the twist here, again, is we talk about the a-symptomatic spread and the fact that a person can have no fevers and cold symptoms and still spread it. i will not be surprised that the cdc will start recommending that people in certain industries will wear masks even if they are not sick. i am talking about the post office, certain businesses, grocery stores. just that, just to keep the extra barrier of safety. >> and especially in this time of year, we are in april, a lot of people have allergies. sometimes you get a headache from that and it's hard to know what is going on. it is.

i have seasonal allergies. my eyes are itching right now. and you know, that can be alarming for people. we have seen a case of pink eye and it was you have to take your symptoms in to context. >> i have never been so scared of catching a cold. stay with us, we are answering questions on th

okay, we are back with special correspondent dr. patel, we want to go back to the question we just answered for all of our facebook live friends. are you able to get the virus a second time the if you have already had or recovered from it? viewer anna is asking the question. i think we all want to know this. so the expert opinion right now is that we don't believe you can get it twice. most experts believe that your immune system will build up

antibodies and you will be protected from getting it. there are reports of people testingpositive and then negative and then positive again. or testing negative and then positive. we think it's an error in the test and not because they were, you know, had covid-19 and got it again. >> is this the same with the other viruses in the coronavirus family, usually you only get it once? >> typically you will build immunity 20 one specific virus strain. there's hundreds of viruses out there. that is why they continue to get common colds. the mask debate. one of the biggest conversations happening right now. here is a question from instagram. should healthy people be wearing a mask, are homemade masks just as good if so. should people at home be wearing

masks? this is a tough one and there's a reason why there's a big debate here. now, if you are healthy and you have no symptoms. it is not a bad thing to wear a cloth pacific, if you are going to go in to a place where you might, encounter something within somebody with high risk, you should not need a mask. we were talking about people in grocery stores, people when they are commuting. there's situations where wearing a mask could prevent somebody from respiratory droplets, or even if they are not showing symptoms, i have to stress, the medical grade masks, the n-95s are

reserved for front line health care providers. we cannot see another hoarding incident like we did with toilet paper. >> that makes me think that the homemade masks are not probably as good, but could still perhaps serve is a purpose? >> and that's absolutely right. so, two things we look at when it comes to a homemade machblsk. you have to breathe through it and it has to function to block the particles and then, it has to fit. you want a good fit, and so some of the due it yourself tutorials try to account for both things. they use pillow cases or a woven cotton t-shirt with a bit of elastic orrer ribbon. these all work fine. they are not at the same high level and they don't need to be. what i want people to understand and it's not meant to sound dramatic. for every n-95 that is not given to a front line healthcare provider that is a potential life at risk. either by a medical professional

or a patient. so that, is why we say if it's a do it yourself mask. you are keeping it clean and washing your hands and not touching your face, more power to you. >> we have a minute before the next break. how do you sterilize a mask after you have worn it? you just spray lys on-- lysol o it? you wash it if it's a fabric? >> i think it depends on the material. for example, if you had a cloth mask, it's the same as a cloth tissue, a dirty mask could be more dangerous than a clean one. a mask, remember, is not a replacement at all for the recommendations happening right now, the shelter in place the physical distance. it's an extra tool. >> all together. okay, how about this question. hospitals in england, we have 30 seconds nor one. hospitals in england are mandating doctors shave facial hair, would they do that here?

i have heard of it happening in some institutions here. the reason why, excess hair can keep a mask from fitting snuggley around the face. so if you have facial hair, and you don't want to shave, there's other types of masks they can use. but i have not heard it being mandated here, i have heard of it happening. i have heard had of officials electing to do it or the supervisors are asking them to do it for safety. >> stay with us, we have a few more questions left with dr.

you're clearly someone who takes care of yourself. so when it comes to screening for colon cancer, don't wait. because when caught early, it's more treatable. i'm cologuard. i'm noninvasive and detect altered dna in your stool to find 92% of colon cancers... ...even in early stages. tell me more. it's for people 45 plus at average risk for colon cancer, not high risk. false positive and negative results may occur. ask your prescriber if cologuard is right for you. i'm on it. that's a step in the right direction. we are back with special correspondent, dr. patel and i wanted to ask you, i was asking in the break, are you most contagious if you have covid-19,

before you have symptoms and when you have symptoms than after? >> i'm not positive that we have a defined rule about when people are the most contagious. you know, there's a count of people that they call super spreaders that are more contagious than others. that did not go with them having big symptoms. and so, you know, an educated guess would be, if you are coughing, if you are sneezing and you are spreading a lot of virus, you would be more contagious, then if you were not shedding that much particle. there's case reports of people being contagious before symptoms started. >> right. okay. so, we have maybe a little over a minute, 2:00 left, let's get a couple of rapid fire in here, somebody wants to know, are people with type-a blood more likely to suffer from covid-19? >> and i understand where that question is coming from. there was a study in china, and they, you know, they found that many people with type-a blood had a higher risk of getting

covid-19. here's the problem, that was a small study. it has not been peer reviewed and it also, if you look at the numbers, there was a variation, in the amount of blood types and every blood type was catching it. i would not worry about your blood type at this time. it's a topic. based on blood types and genetics that people will keep exploring and look to see if they can replicate it. >> can you get it from a mosquito? >> not yet. i'm sorry, would he, not yet, no, you cannot get it from a mow k -- >> does getting the flu shot help? >> getting the flu shot would help you from having the flu and covid-19 at the same time. which would not be a good thing. but the flu shot does not have protection against this virus. it's a different virus than influenza. >> i'm told we have time for one more question. how long do you have to wash

your clothes if you have been around somebody with covid-19? how long do you have to wash your clothes for? >> we just say a routine wash cycle. just a routine wash cycle, people that are out and about, may get the droplets, changing the clothes outside the front door, inside the garage, good idea when in doubt. >> especially since our workers are out and coming home to families. thank you so much for joining us, we appreciate it, dr. patel, we love chatting with you and getting all the answers to everyone's questions. we would like to thank everyone at home for joining us for the new experimental interactive show, we are going to be here every day at 3:00, on air and live stream answering your questions like we did today. we had so many great ones. you can check us out on facebook live, abc-7 news.com and we are tracking the questions that were not answered today, we will save

them for the next expert, so don't worry we will get your questions asked tonight, the coronavirus here in the u.s. more than 1,100 deaths in just 24 hours. and breaking news in new york city. the president just approved the use of the javid center for coronavirus patients. and tonight, new york's governor warning new york could be out of ventilators in just six days. and what the governor said just today about when this could peak here in the epicenter. tonight, news coming in, the virus taking a devastating toll. three infected members of the same family dying. the doctors and nurses on the front lines. hundreds of health care workers now sick. the e.r. doctor tonight who has now died. and the harrowing message from a group of nurses in boston, sending a video out. their plea. states just now imposing stay at home orders after