TERRIBLE ‘STRAIN’
Healthy but panicked people draining resources New York has its first 2 deaths from COVID-19 Don tests negative for bug, says he’s totally ‘normal’
Take a deep, deep breath, New Yorkers: It only feels like the sky is falling.
Fear and paranoia amped up once again Saturday with word of the state’s first coronavirus fatalites.
The first was an octogenarian woman already afflicted with emphysema.
The second virus victim was a 64-year-old Suffern man, who had “other significant health problems” that contributed to his death, said Rockland County’s Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Laura Carbone.
Nearly three weeks after the first two infected New Yorkers were identified, the number of people diagnosed statewide with the virus is 613 — the most of any state, but still about only 0.003% of the population. Officials count 269 cases in New York City, Gov. Cuomo said Saturday night.
Nationwide, officials report at least 51 deaths and nearly 2,500 confirmed infections.
Experts say the prescription for handling the weeks ahead is for residents to stay calm, follow the protocols and don’t overreact to every symptom or bump in the number of positive tests. Healthy patients clogging emergency rooms, for example, only delay treatment of the infected.
Another suggestion from medical experts: Seek out reliable sources of information, like the CDC, rather than relying on your neighbor’s latest Facebook post.
While local hospitals are amped up for the crisis — one nursing union official said they were braced for a “war” — it’s the ranks of the socalled “worried well” who could cause the biggest problems. The World Health Organization reported that 80% of coronavirus cases involved nothing beyond mild symptoms, while experts fear a flood of nonsymptomatic patients with nothing more than a case of the nerves.
“If you have no symptoms and you’ve not been near anyone who’s tested positive for the coronavirus, you should stay away,” advised Ann Bove, a veteran nurse who worked on the medical front lines during the AIDS epidemic.
Any patients scheduled for elective visits or nonessential procedures should postpone them immediately to ease the burden placed on already harried physicians and nurses, she added.
Local hospitals had no hard numbers of random people appearing at their emergency rooms without a really good reason.
At Bellevue Hospital one day last week, emergency room traffic went from hectic to steady but hardly overwhelming. At Brooklyn’s Wyckoff Medical Center on a random day, only 10 adults were waiting to see an ER doctor.
“Some people were freaking out earlier,” one on-call doctor at Bellevue told the Daily News. “But we have protocols for something like this.”
Hospital officials acknowledged the difficulties of both the past two weeks and the days ahead. At NYU Langone Hospital New York, the possibility of swabbing patients in outdoor tents at their facilities could begin this week to combat the chance of people appearing en masse at the emergency room.
“It’s definitely stressful,” said Dr. Viraj Lakdawala of Langone. “We’ve had to ramp up our services very, very rapidly. We went from a bad flu season into basically everyone in New York knocking on our door.”
Part of the solution is steering people to telemedicine, with potential patients reaching out to physicians via computer or phone to determine if they are at risk.
Lakdawala said the Langone facilities had also secured all of their personal protective equipment to stop any frightened patients from turning to larceny.
“We might have a visitor who sees a box of masks and takes it,” he said. “They just can’t get them anyplace else. So we’re protecting our supply.”
Dr. Mark Jarrett, chief quality officer for Northwell Health, couldn’t provide specific ER numbers but said things were busier than normal since the state’s first two cases were announced on March 2. Northwell is also planning to establish some manner of external triage facilities if needed, although they are waiting to pull the
trigger.
While he understands the instinct for worried people to appear at the ER, he suggested people shouldn’t act on impulse — especially if they are asymptomatic.
“They just want to be safe, but if they don’t have symptoms, there’s a very good chance the test will be negative,” he said. “We understand why people are concerned. But if they’re not having symptoms, it’s not the time to get the tests.”
Gov. Cuomo has repeatedly stated that the rising number of positive cases was a good thing, as it quickly put diagnosed coronavirus patients in quarantine and away from the general public. But he encouraged people to avoid rushing to the emergency room if possible.
“That’s the last thing you want to do,” he said Saturday during a CNN appearance. “If you are positive, you wind up infecting other people and staff. If you’re not positive, you wind up exposing yourself in an emergency room with someone who may be positive.”
He also noted that thousands of New Yorkers were likely infected but suffered nothing more dire than a bit of discomfort.
“If not the tens of thousands,” the governor said. “All probability is thousands have had the virus and selfresolved and never knew. … It is context and perspective. I get the anxiety but, you know, facts matter here also.”
In New Rochelle, the epicenter of the state outbreak, a drive-through testing area is now up and running. A cluster of cases now numbering above 100 patients began with one local attorney, a prime example of “community spread” of the virus.
Other medial professionals suggested a visit to a personal physician before any kind of self-diagnosis, or for people to compare their current symptoms to previous bouts with severe colds or the flu.
One other thing: The region’s medical professionals and hospitals say they are ready for whatever lies ahead.
“There is no hysteria,” said a nurse’s aide at Bellevue. “It’s our job and we’re doing our job. Somebody’s got to do it.”