By Rick Green
The Laconia Daily Sun
CONCORD — People who come to New Hampshire from other states for an extended stay should quarantine themselves for two weeks, Gov. Chris Sununu said Monday.
His recommendation comes amid a travel advisory from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention urging residents of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut to refrain from non-essential domestic travel for 14 days.
While Eastern population centers have a greater problem with COVID-19 than New Hampshire, the number of cases in the Granite State continues to increase.
State Epidemiologist Dr. Benjamin Chan, who joined Sununu in an afternoon news conference, said the number of people who have tested positive for the disease in New Hampshire totals 314, up 56 from the previous day.
The town of Moultonborough, where there are many vacation homes, has an advisory on its website asking out-of-state visitors to observe social distancing recommendations and to self-quarantine for two weeks if they plan a long stay.
“We truly understand your desire to relocate to a less populated and infected area to reduce the risk of contracting the Coronavirus,” the advisory said. “However, it’s important to know our small community has limited health care and emergency services to handle a large outbreak of coronavirus patients.”
The advisory also said the town only has a small number of first-responders, limited personal protection equipment and the two closest hospitals are 20 miles away.
“If any of our services’ members become infected or in contact with a person with the virus, our resources will be gravely affected,” the advisory stated.
Walter Johnson, town administrator, said in an interview Monday he has been seeing a lot of license plates from Massachusetts and some from Connecticut and Rhode Island, well before the usual tourist influx.
“It seems to be earlier than the usual Memorial Day timeframe,” he said.
Dr. Elisabeth Pott-Grinstein, who works at Caring for Women in Laconia, said she is seeing people starting to occupy summer homes in her Lakeport neighborhood and is concerned about people coming from areas where the disease is more prevalent.
“We started in such a great situation with a low infection rate and a low death rate. That can change,” she said. “I believe it is changing rapidly because we have such an influx of people coming to the state from the epicenter, New York City, and other cities.
“We’re not doing enough here to test people who may have the virus and are transferring it quietly in the community.”
Laconia Mayor Andrew Hosmer said people have reached out to him with concerns that people coming to New Hampshire from Massachusetts may think the same social distancing rules don’t apply here.
“We all have to take a certain level of responsibility and isolate ourselves as much as possible,” he said.
“We all have to be aware that COVID-19 can and will be asymptomatic in certain people and limiting contact with each other is critically important in arresting this virus.”
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