In his Thursday afternoon address to Kentucky, Governor Andy Beshear issued an executive order mandating the wearing of masks or facial coverings in public.

After noting the record number of spikes in cases of COVID-19 around the country and acknowledging that Kentucky hasn't gotten THAT bad, he did mention that the Commonwealth has, nonetheless, seen a steady increase over the last few days.

Yesterday, there were 402 new cases. Today 333 were reported.

The mandate for masks or facial coverings includes wearing them in retail establishments, grocery stores...generally any front-facing business.

And if you're outside in a group and you can't manage to be six feet from someone else, masks or facial coverings will be required.

Governor Beshear said that this is something the National Retail Federation has been requesting across the country, and, in fact, several states--and now Kentucky--have stepped up and made facial coverings mandatory.

The governor said the mask mandate will be enforced by local health departments and will start out running one month and that after 30 days there will be a reassessment on Kentucky's progress.

The mandate will go into effect at 5PM Friday, July 10th, 2020.

The details of the mandate begin at the 27:42 mark:

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