A medic with Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services has tested positive for the coronavirus — the department's first employee to get infected.
ATCEMS is providing food, health care, mental health care and daily chats to check in on the medic.
"The risk is very high that we can become infected too," Rodriguez said. "The best thing that people can do to help us is to follow the directives that have been issued by our public health agencies and practice social distancing, wash your hands and limit your contacts — don't go anywhere if you don't have to."
Dr. Jason Pickett, alternate public health authority for Austin-Travis County, answered questions about the COVID-19 crisis in Austin in a Wednesday afternoon news conference.
Watch the full video with Dr. Pickett here:
Overnight, Austin and Travis County's stay-at-home orders went into effect to help stop the spread of the coronavirus.
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If the stay-at-home orders were not instituted, the city's interim health authority, Dr. Mark Escott said, "by May, we will need to be able to provide 20,000 hospital beds a day for our community alone."
