NY’S GRAND REOPENING – IN 4 ACTS
Gov unveils phased plan
Gov. Cuomo on Monday fleshed out his plans for awakening New York’s economy from its coronavirus-induced slumber — as another 226 New Yorkers succumbed to the disease.
“People are all talking about reopening, which we should be talking about,” Cuomo said in a press briefing at the Wegmans Conference Center in upstate Rochester.
“This is not a sustainable situation, close down everything, close down the economy, lock yourself in the home.”
Cuomo said last month that construction and manufacturing in less hard-hit regions would be the first sectors to trickle back on once the current installment of the statewide prohibition on nonessential business expires on May 15.
On Monday, he expanded on that plan, now divided into four phases.
In addition to construction and manufacturing, the first group of services to return will include wholesale suppliers and select retail businesses that offer curbside pickup, Cuomo said.
The second phase would see the return of sectors including finance and insurance, real estate and other retail businesses.
Restaurants and hotels would come back online in the third phase, while the fourth phase would bring back arts and entertainment venues, as well as education.
“Density is not your friend here.
Large gatherings are not your friend,” Cuomo said. “That’s why those situations would be down at theend.”
Cuomo also introduced a region-by-region score card, grading areas of the state on seven metrics they would need to meet in order to consider a gradual return to normalcy.
Those metrics were:
A 14-day decline in hospitalizations or fewer than 15 new hospital admissions over a three-day rolling average.
A 14-day decline in hospital deaths or fewer than five deaths total over a three-day rolling average.
A rate of new hospitalizations below two per 100,000 residents across a three-day rolling average.
At least 30 percent of total hospital beds unoccupied.
At least 30 percent of ICU hospital beds unoccupied.
At least 30 tests for every 1,000 residents per month.
At least 30 contact tracers retained per 100,000 residents.
As of Monday, no region in the state had met more than five of the seven metrics.
New York City meets three of the criteria: the 14-day declines in both hospitalizations and deaths, plus the monthly testing numbers.
Long Island is the furthest off, having met only the 14-day decline in hospitalizations and the monthly testing threshold.
Cuomo articulated his vision for the future as the statewide numbers continued to trend in the right direction — although not quickly enough for his liking.
The number of current hospitalizations declined from 9,786 to 9,647 Saturday into Sunday, according to statistics from the state Department of Health.
The drop was aided by a three-day rolling average of new coronavirus hospitalizations that declined in the same period, from 789 to 717, the figures show.
But another 226 succumbed to the disease in the 24-hour period ending at midnight Monday — down from 280 in the period prior — raising the overall death toll to 19,415.
“This is the number that haunts me every day,” Cuomo said. “That’s 226 wives or brothers or sisters or children that are now suffering the loss of a loved one.”