HI Lt. Gov. Josh Green: “I guess I had to get COVID to make my point”

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    Honolulu, HI (KITV) — Hawaii Lieutenant Governor Josh Green plans to work while in isolation over the next two weeks after testing positive for COVID-19 yesterday. He tells KITV-4’s Annalisa Burgos the news didn’t come as a complete surprise to him and his wife.

“Jamie and I always expected that I would test positive for COVID eventually. This was my fifth, maybe sixth test. And I’ve been getting tested because I wanted to make sure at intervals that I didn’t expose anyone. Because a lot of times, this is one of the things we always are preaching, which is you could be an asymptomatic carrier,” the LG said.

And that he was.

Lt. Gov. Green explained a member of his security detail felt sick on Tuesday and by Friday had tested positive for COVID-19, prompting the LG to get tested.

“We were in a car together essentially for an hour driving up the coast and an hour driving back and we were wearing masks except we take sips from our coffee and being in a car together, I guess, was enough for that to be the likely way that I caught it,” he said.

The LG says the staff member’s wife went to the hospital around September 1 for upper respiratory problems, but her doctor did not have her tested for COVID-19. That turned out to be a bad call.

“If we had known sooner, then he would have taken the weekend off and I likely wouldn’t have contracted COVID,” he said.

The doctor’s call not to test one person for COVID-19 underscores how fast the virus can spread in a matter of days — potentially exposing dozens of people Lt. Gov. Green interacted with — his wife and children, 14 staff members, five Honolulu radio station employees and anyone he came in contact with while working as an ER doctor at Kohala Hospital last weekend.

When asked which hospital made the call, the LG declined to name it and said it’s no one’s fault.

“She should have gotten tested. There’s no question. She got put on some antibiotics, which won’t treat a virus, but look, I’ve been there myself. I’ve made a judgment call and have to stand by it. I will say that I am very, very permissive about ordering tests and I always have been from the beginning,” he said.

“If you get that test at the right time, you might stop the need for 20 other tests and three other five other cases right? So everyone I hope they’ll listen. When they see me promoting 500 contact tracers and 10,000 tests, it’s for a reason, for a short time, so that this doesn’t happen. And so that we can open the economy and open schools,” he said. “I guess I had to get COVID to make my point.”

Lt. Gov. Green believes it’s unlikely Governor David Ige was exposed.

“I’m almost certain he couldn’t be because we do all of our meetings through zoom or Microsoft teams or whatever. So, for the purposes of continuity of government, we’ve intentionally not been together in meetings,” he said. “I know a lot of people think must be the Gov is pissed at Green again, but it’s really… you want both individuals to be healthy just in case, right?”

While he and his wife have fears and concerns like other families living with COVID, Lt. Gov. remains positive and is advocating for the Governor to reopen the state on October 1 as scheduled.

KITV-4 reached out to the Governor’s Office for comment. A spokeswoman said she does not know if Gov. Ige will get tested for COVID-19, but said the 5th floor offices at the State Capitol have been disinfected.

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