►Local COVID-19 deaths hit 500

Virus claimed 100 lives in Capital Region in a month

The Capital Region crossed a grim milestone on Wednesday, as four more resident deaths due to COVID -19 brought the region’s known death toll from the disease to 500.

The latest victims were residents of Albany, Rensselaer and Warren counties. Albany County Executive Dan Mccoy said Wednesday that the county ’s victims were a woman in her 60s and a man in his 70s. Rensselaer County officials confirmed the death of a 71-year-old woman from North Greenbush. And Warren County officials said they lost a local nursing home resident, though they didn’t specify in which facility the person was living when they died.

“My condolences and prayers go to the family, to all the family members,” McCoy said. “Please take a moment, take a step back and appreciate everything you have in your life and cherish the people around you because at the end of the day, hopefully they ’re around for a long time, but the reality is if something happens to

them, enjoy the moments you have.”

The deaths come as the region is experiencing record numbers of new coronavirus infections and hospitalizations.

On Monday, eight local counties reported a total of 1,042 new coronavirus infections. It was the first time throughout the pandemic that the region’s daily caseload had crossed the 1,000 mark.

In Albany County, where officials expressed concern about daily caseloads in the 100s just after Thanksgiving, daily caseloads in the 200s are now starting to become the norm. On Wednesday, Mccoy said the county confirmed 218 new cases of the virus — marking the third day in a row that cases topped 200 in the county and the eighth time this month. Most of those cases could not be traced back to an exposure source. The others were connected to people who work in health care or who had contact with infected people, Mccoy said.

The rise in cases is resulting in record hospitalizations and increasing deaths.

Capital Region hospitals in the eight-county area reported 380 COVID -19 patients on Tuesday, an increase of 18 from the day before and more than double what it was a month ago. On Tuesday, Capital Region hospital leaders said they have begun to limit nonurgent surgeries in an effort to save space for what they anticipate will be a surge of new COVID -19 patients in January.

“Any hopes of seeing a continued downward trend of the number of residents currently hospitalized from the virus were dashed today, as we saw an alarming record 18 new hospitalizations in just a 24-hour period,”

Mccoy said Wednesday. “On top of that, we still have a record number of people in intensive care. While we do what we can to slow the spread of the virus, regional hospital leaders are now making the difficult but necessary decision to take a proactive approach in slowing down or even putting a pause on nonurgent surgeries to ensure they have the proper staffing and bed capacity. This will allow them to care for every patient that comes in, whether they have COVID or not.”

The Capital Region saw nearly 300 deaths from the virus during the first three months of the pandemic, and then a summer lull hit.

It took five more months for the region to cross the 400 death mark — on Nov. 27. Now, less than a month later, the region has crossed the 500 mark.

Among the eight counties, Albany accounts for many of the deaths with 196 known coronavirus fatalities. As of Wednesday, Rensselaer County had the next highest death toll (79), followed by Schenectady County (73), Columbia County (49), Warren County (36), Saratoga County (31), Greene County (23) and Washington County (13).

Elsewhere

Glens Falls Hospital said Wednesday it received its first shipment of the Moderna vaccine and has begun vaccinating employees. Some doses received are earmarked for EMS and other first responders — the hospital said it is working directly with these first responder teams to get their members vaccinated.

“Glens Falls Hospital has not received vaccine to be given to the general public, nor do we know the timeline of such vaccines, or where the public will go to receive the vaccine,” the hospital said in a statement.