| Welcome to another un-springlike day. Twin Cities will be sunny in the morning, before clouds and scattered snow and rain showers move in. Highs in the upper 30s with 10 to 15 mph winds. Statewide, highs in the 30s with scattered clouds. More on Updraft. | Forecast Sometimes, the news repeats itself. The economic toll from the COVID-19 pandemic is disproportionately harming women and people of color. While this isn’t a shock given historic and structural inequities, we now have some data to prove what’s happening in this time. About 14 percent of Minnesota’s workforce has applied for unemployment in recent weeks. In total, that’s just shy of 452,000 Minnesotans and twice the number of jobless aid applicants from all of last year, according to Steve Grove, the state’s employment and economic development commissioner. Nearly 26 percent of the non-white labor force is seeking unemployment help. And 55 percent of total applicants are women. About 12 percent of the white labor force is applying for unemployment. “The scope and scale of this is stunning,” Grove said. The latest coronavirus statistics: 1,695 cases via 39,241 tests 79 deaths 405 cases requiring hospitalization 177 people remain in the hospital; 75 in ICUs 13 percent of cases in health care workers 909 patients recovered
Martin County continues to have the most-severe outbreak relative to population. It’s population is 19,785, yet it has seen 39 cases and four deaths from COVID-19. Wilkin County, a tiny region south of Moorhead on the North Dakota border, comes in second. It has seven cases and two deaths — with just 6,254 residents. State lawmakers are becoming more divided on how to handle the coronavirus. But they did push through another package related to the pandemic on Tuesday. Among its provisions: remote access to marriage licenses for couples; more breathing room on debt for farmers; assured coronavirus testing and treatment for people without insurance; money for food shelves to buy excess milk and other products; some Health Department regulations are waived to speed COVID-19 response; more latitude for courts to deal with disrupted cases. Read more from reporter Brian Bakst. Many of us are waiting for our $1,200 federal stimulus checks. How’re you going to spend yours? Is it enough money to help out? Tell us here. — Cody Nelson, MPR News | 
