New cases hit 346 for first time in Albany Co.
Deaths continue to trend upward throughout the Capital Region’s counties
Albany County moved into the new year with the highest total yet for new coronavirus cases as local officials braced for a month they already feared would be the deadliest since the pandemic started.
The county set a new record to end 2020 with 346 new coronavirus cases overnight.
County Executive Dan Mccoy said there were also three deaths, a woman in her 70s and a man and a woman in their 60s.
The county ’s previous record for new cases in a day was 269, set on Dec. 24. While the new record was shocking, it was not totally unsurprising: The county expected it would break 300 cases a day in January, Mccoy said.
Coronavirus cases have climbed dramatically over the past two months, with medical experts and government officials blaming gatherings during the Thanksgiving and holiday season for the increased spread of the virus.
“We still have not felt the full effect from Christmas,” he said. “This is easily the highest day increase we’ve ever seen.”
The county saw 17 new hospitalizations, for a total of 114. Twentyone of those patients are in intensive care.
Several of the counties in the Capital Region reported deaths on Friday, including Saratoga and Schenectady counties, which both lost three people, according to state data. Two residents died in Greene County. Another person died in Rensselaer County as did
someone in Washington County. Overall, 600 cases were reported in the region.
The numbers from around the state show that 394 people from around the region are hospitalized with the virus. Over the last seven days, local hospitals reported just 25 percent of hospital beds — and 19 percent of intensive care beds — were unoccupied.
Of the new cases in Albany County, 263 had no clear source of transmission, 58 had close contact with a positive case, 24 are health care workers and one person reported out of state travel.
Mccoy asked county residents to continue to follow public health guidelines and be patient, acknowledging that some residents may be fatigued from the restrictions put in place since the pandemic began. He added that the county expected daily case numbers to continue to grow.
“The vaccine is going to take time to get here, we need to be patient,” he said. “It’s probably going to be alarming for the numbers tomorrow and the day after that and the day after that.”
Warren County reported 44 new cases on Friday. The county reported 11 were hospitalized, the highest number its recorded since the pandemic started early last year. County officials said all of those hospitalized had moderate cases of the virus.
One of the new cases involves a person who had been on the Hadley-Luzerne Central School’s campus, forcing the district to scrap plans to bring back high school students for in-person classes on Monday. Instead, the district said it was asking shigh school and junior high students to continue remote learning until Jan. 19.
The region’s seven-day average for positive coronavirus tests on Thursday was 9.57 percent, third highest in the state.