Hello from the Heartland. My name is Jenna, and this is Smarter News, news when it matters and why it matters.

Our Smarter series features unique people who help us think and live smarter.

Today we're back with Dr. Michael Perry, Chair of Infectious Diseases at Stanford Hospital in Connecticut.

And as his title suggests, infectious diseases are his specialty and have been for the last 40 years.

We wanted to follow up with him to see what he's learned as a physician about COVID-19.

But we also covered some key topics I'm certain we all have questions about.

How is he applying social distancing to his own private life?

And what is he telling his family?

About an hour after our conversation, the U.S. government announced they are expanding

priority testing to include those 65 and older with nearly no fever. This is important.

Listen to what Dr. Perry says about the symptoms he's seeing on a local level and share that with your

family and friends. Just something to note, you'll hear him mention Quest and Lab Corps. These are

private laboratories now able to

process COVID-19 tests. This is new. When we last talked, this wasn't the case. In fact, when we

last spoke, Dr. Perry hadn't had a COVID-19 case at his hospital, but that also changed. Local

reports said a woman in her 60s, who recently traveled to Italy, upon returning home,

came almost immediately to the hospital and tested positive for the new coronavirus.

I had about 101 questions on this particular case, but I had to limit those questions somewhat

because of Dr. Perry's position and, of course, patient privacy.

But that's where we started our conversation.

First things first, we saw some news reports that your hospital saw a case of the new coronavirus. What can you tell us about that case?

Well, that was a case that we saw a couple of weeks ago related to travel, international travel.

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