VISITORS FROM THREE MORE U.S. STATES WHO TRAVEL TO NEW YORK WILL BE REQUIRED TO QUARANTINE FOR 14 DAYS TO CONTROL THE SPREAD OF CORONAVIRUS AS ALARM GROWS OVER A SURGE IN INFECTIONS IN THE COUNTRY.
NEW YORK • Visitors from three more U.S. states who travel to New York will be required to quarantine for 14 days to control the spread of coronavirus, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said on Tuesday, as alarm grew over a surge in infections in large parts of the country.
New York state, which had been the early epicentre of the outbreak in the United States, unveiled the travel advisory last month in an effort to prevent a resurgence after the state got its outbreak under control.
Delaware, Kansas and Oklahoma, all of which are grappling with “significant” community spread of the virus, have been added to the list, Cuomo said, bringing the total number of states under the travel advisory to 19.
New Jersey also added the three states to its quarantine order.
Parts of the U.S., including Florida, Texas and California, have experienced a sharp rise in infections in the past two weeks, an indication that the pandemic remains largely uncontrolled.
A line of more than 200 cars snaked around the United Memorial Medical Center in Houston on Tuesday as people waited for hours in sweltering heat to get tested for COVID-19, the sometimes fatal illness caused by the coronavirus. Some had arrived the night before in order to secure a test at the drive-thru site.
In Florida, more than four dozen hospitals reported that their intensive care units have reached capacity as COVID-19 cases continue to surge in the state and throughout the country.
Hospital intensive care units were full at 54 hospitals across 25 of Florida’s 67 counties, according to data from 300 hospitals in the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration.
New COVID-19 infections are rising in 42 states, based on a Reuters analysis of cases for the past two weeks compared to the prior two weeks, bringing the total number of cases in the country close to 3 million.
More than 130,000 Americans have died of COVID-19 — about a quarter of the global total — and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has forecast that the death toll could reach 160,000 later this month.
The surge has forced authorities to backpedal on moves to reopen businesses, after mandatory lockdowns in March and April reduced economic activity to a virtual standstill and put millions of Americans out of work.
More states are reporting a troubling increase in the percentage of COVID-19 diagnostic tests coming back positive — a key indicator of community spread that experts refer to as positivity rate.
Two dozen states, mostly in the South and West, have averaged positivity rates over the past week exceeding five per cent, a level the World Health Organization considers to be concerning, data collected by Reuters shows.