Gov. Kay Ivey on Tuesday said she was “as eager as anybody” see Alabama citizens get back to work, but said more COVID-19 testing would be needed before the could fully reopen. In the meantime, her stay-at-home order and its April 30 expiration date remain in effect.

“No one wants to open business more than I do,” Ivey said during a conference Tuesday morning. “We had 2.7% unemployment back in February, and I want to get back to that.”

However, she said, her first priority is the health of Alabamians, and that means increasing testing and decreasing the number of new COVID-19 cases being confirmed in the state each day. Based on daily case counts made available by the Alabama Department of Public Health, the state is still increasing by at least 150 cases per day.

State health officer Dr. Scott Harris said it’s improving “in a way we’re very pleased with,” but he agreed with Ivey that testing is not where it should be. Ivey said as of Tuesday, less than 1% of Alabama’s population had been tested for the disease.

“Before we get fully operational, we have to increase our testing,” she said.

Harris and Ivey each declined to specify how much of an increase would be needed, though.

Ivey deferred to Harris, saying her opinion on how much is enough was irrelevant.

“My opinion doesn’t count,” she said. “It’s the health people that help us know much we’ve got to test.”

“I think we want to feel comfortable that we can test people when they needed to be tested,” Harris said.

He said he’d like for it to be as simple as going to the doctor for a glucose, flu or other test, but said such testing “is not going to be realistic for any state any time soon.”

For now, state officials continue to encourage residents to practice social distancing, good personal hygiene and staying at home as much as possible. Harris acknowledged the temptation to travel from Alabama to neighboring states as those states relax their guidelines, but he asked residents to remember their actions protect not just themselves but the more vulnerable members of the population.

For many, COVID-19 can cause mild or even no symptoms, but health experts say even those without symptoms can spread it to elderly or immunocompromised individuals. Those individuals are the most at-risk for severe complications and even death from the disease.

“We need people to try to remember that just a little while longer,” Harris said. “Dawn is breaking pretty soon, but we just have a little bit further to go.”

“We’ve got to lower this COVID-19 rate,” Ivey said. “It’s got to start declining more than it is.”

She said every governor is responsible for reading the numbers and doing what is best for their state, and for Alabama, that means more testing, fewer new cases and focusing on the data, not a desired date.

“It’s been a challenging month. We’ve lost too many of our loved ones and our way of life has been turned upside down, but better days are ahead,” Ivey said. “We all look forward to that.”

Tuesday’s numbers

Limestone County remained at 40 total confirmed cases as of 5 p.m. Tuesday, according to ADPH. Those numbers do not reflect the number of active infections of COVID-19 and are instead the total number of patients with lab-confirmed positive test results since March 13, when the first confirmed case was announced.

Statewide, the total has risen to 5,296, with 144 confirmed deaths out of 181 reported and 699 hospitalizations reported since March 13. Nearly 50,000 have been tested for the disease statewide, including 698 tests in Limestone County.

Those cases are part of the more than 820,000 cases across the country, according to Johns Hopkins University of Medicine, and more than 2.5 million globally.