'We've got a ways to go': Gov. Edwards says don't expect statewide mask mandate to be lifted

BATON ROUGE, La. (BRPROUD) - Governor John Bel Edwards said Louisiana still has work to do before considering ending the mask mandate.

“I don’t think anybody should anticipate we will lose the mask mandate," said Gov. Edwards. "We just simply haven’t made enough progress. It appears the numbers are starting to come in to show that we have arrested the worsening. We have kind of flattened out about two weeks after this mandate went into place, which is what you would expect. We’ve got a ways to go."

The current mask mandate is set to end on September 1.

The Louisiana Department of Health is reporting 139 new deaths in the past 24 hours, making this the largest single-day count since the beginning of the pandemic.

On Tuesday, Edwards toured a COVID-19 vaccination site at LSU Health Shreveport and continues to urge Louisianans to get vaccinated.