Governor Eric Holcomb and state leaders announced on Friday afternoon during his daily coronavirus address the detailed plan to reopen Indiana as the battle against the virus continues.

The plan includes five stages, the first of which Indiana is already in which has allowed elective surgeries to be conducted, as well as the opening of essential business and critical infrastructure.

State officials expect COVID-19 cases will increase with each stage, but the focus will be on making sure health care capacity is able to handle those cases.

There will be four requirements to begin the stages which include the number of hospitalized patients statewide has decreased for 14 straight days, the state retains surge capacity to handle patients needing ICU care and ventilators, to be able to test all Hoosiers with COVID-19 symptoms, and finally to have the ability to contact all individuals who came in contact with someone testing positive for COVID-19 and expand contact tracing.

Holcomb went on to say that he hopes that the state will be close to fully reopened sometime around July 4th.