New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced Saturday that New York is continuing to flatten the curve as the state may be at the apex of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The [total] number of hospitalizations appears to have hit an apex,” Cuomo said at his daily coronavirus briefing where he displayed that the current number of hospitalizations is at 18,654. New York City has 64 percent of COVID-19 hospitalizations while Long Island has 22 percent. Intubations were negative 26 Friday, a decrease that the governor called a good sign.
The governor had originally called for 140,000 beds and 30,000 ventilators based on projections. New York’s previous hospital capacity was 53,000 beds, which has since increased to 90,000 beds.
He said Friday the temporary hospitals at the Javits Center and the U.S. Navy Ship Comfort – which are staffed with federal personnel – “are an overflow relief capacity valve” that will not have to be used if the hospitalization rates continue to stay low, but hospitals have been told that they have those facilities at their disposals should they need them.
As of Friday night only 332 patients have been moved to these facilities that have a combined capacity of 3,000 hospital beds for COVID-19 patients, according to a report by the New York Post.
Cuomo took a shot at conspiracy theories for why governments closed down in light of projections missing the mark by wide margin, calling those ideas “corrosive.”
“There are no political conspiracies here. All the projection models have basically said the same thing…All the experts have higher projection numbers than we actually experienced and they all said caveat government action could flatten the curve but we don’t know what governments will do and we don’t know if people will even listen to what governments will do,” Cuomo said.
Cuomo said he has kept politics out of the coronavirus response, commending President Donald Trump for being “responsive to New York’s needs.” The governor also stated that he is “not running for anything…I am the governor of New York and that’s where I’m going to stay.”
“I have no political agenda, period. I’m not running for president. I’m not running for vice president. I’m not running anywhere. I’m not going to Washington. I’m staying right here,” he said to shut down any qualms or misgivings.
The governor said that New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, who earlier in the day announced that city schools would be shut down for the remainder of the academic year, could not make that decision “without coordinating that decision with the whole metropolitan region.”
“I understand the mayor’s position…and we may do that, but we’re going to coordinated sense with the other localities. It makes no sense for one locality to take an action that’s not coordinated with the others,” Cuomo said of de Blasio’s decision.
New York currently has 180,458 confirmed cases and 8,627 deaths. There were 783 novel coronavirus deaths in the state Friday, after losing 777 people Thursday.
“These are just incredible numbers depicting incredible loss and pain, especially this week. All 783 individuals and families are in our thoughts and in our prayers,” Cuomo said.
As for when this pandemic will end, Cuomo quoted Winston Churchill to say that New York is possibly facing “the end of the beginning” with regard with the pandemic, adding: “This was a beginning phase. We are all trying to figure it out, we are all trying to adjust, but it is the end of that beginning.”
The governor urged New Yorkers to continue to abide by social distancing guidelines, as he said the current outlook of the pandemic is a “product of our actions.”
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