Since the epidemic began, New York is now seeing its lowest number of ICU admissions related to coronavirus on Thursday. New York's governor, Andrew Cuomo, expressed how he was 'cautiously optimistic' that New York had seen the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Coronavirus-related hospital admissions slightly increased from 200 new admissions to 250 on Thursday, but the three-day average remains to be a low number. For the first time on Thursday, intensive care admissions are at a negative number, -17, since the virus entered the state.
Anticipating the surge of more coronavirus patients for the weeks to come, Governor Cuomo started planning to add 40,000 beds to the present capacity of 53,000. He was predicting a need for 140,000 beds, but as of Friday, only 18,569 were being used.
Cuomo claims that as citizens are vigilant to stay at home and practice precautions, New York is now flattening the curve. He now hopes to move forward from the horrific past weeks and continue head-on with the fight against the pandemic.
With his game face on, Cuomo now focuses on producing antibody tests up and running by next week to be able to start testing on a mass scale. As of now, the state Department of Health can only do 300 tests a day, but the governor says that the testing capacity will rise to 1,000 next week. He claims that by the end of next week, the state should have produced at least 7,000 tests ready for use by the public.
New York's Struggle with Coronavirus
With the United States being hit with the most cases, President Trump warned citizens last week to brace themselves as an increasing number of deaths would be expected. The death toll continues to rise, but now at a slower rate. As of Thursday, 777 more deaths have been recorded in the city, bringing the total to 7,844.
New York has the highest number of cases of any US state, with 170,512 cases of coronavirus confirmed. The city has seen the largest number of cases and deaths within the state in this fight against the pandemic. The governor reported 731 deaths on Monday as the number of killed in New York City eclipses death toll from 9/11.
With the increasing number of deaths in New York, morgues are filling up and could not keep up with the volume of dead bodies being sent their way. Some bodies are being sent to be buried on Hart Island, a potter's field, off the coast of the Bronx. It has been a burial ground for the numerous epidemics affecting New York and holds more than one million cadavers underneath its soil.
Antibody Tests Kits
The next phase for New York is producing antibody test kits to determine if a person contracted the virus and has recovered from it. The equipment will allow people to 'gradually' get back to work.
New York's capacity to produce these tests is just slowly building, as the state could only provide 300 as of the moment, but Gov. Cuomo promises to ramp up production to at least 2,000 per day in the following week. He is calling on the federal government for help to scale the production of the test kits, as he believes the numbers won't add up for the millions that need the test.
Cuomo admits to the struggle he is currently facing on thinking of how to keep the production numbers up. He claims that the materials for the testing agent are hard to find. The need for extensive mobilization where the government can produce the test in millions would be badly needed.
It remains to be a blur why other states like California seem to be further ahead with the antibody test kit production. Three thousand two hundred test kits have been done privately by Stanford University doctors, and hundreds more are being done today. Meanwhile, in Colorado, a couple who run a private laboratory has done 6,000 tests on residents in their county alone.
Despite these minor setbacks in antibody test kit production, New York still seems to be holding up. Signs continue to show that the state is ready to bounce back slowly but surely from the tragedy caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
