New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said on Saturday that a recent drop in hospitalizations and other improving metrics indicated the state may be past the peak of its coronavirus crisis and on a path toward stabilizing its battered healthcare system, Reuters reported.
Cuomo’s cautiously upbeat report at a daily briefing came as the daily death toll across the state, the epicenter of the pandemic in the United States, dropped to 540 on April 17, down from 630 a day earlier and the lowest in more than two weeks.
The governor said total hospitalizations of patients being treated for COVID-19, the respiratory illness caused by the coronavirus, came to 16,967, a drop of more than 1,300 over the past three days. Intubations and admissions to intensive care units also continued on their downward trend.
Cuomo repeated a call for the federal government to help coordinate and provide funding for the mass testing that he and other governors have said is needed to determine when it is safe for people to go back to work, MSNBC reports.
Gov. Cuomo said now that NY State has started to flatten the increase of critically ill coronavirus patients, he will send ventilators to states that are still struggling to contain the virus.
“There are other places in this country that are now seeing increases in the death rate,” Cuomo said Wednesday during a press briefing. “I will never forget the generosity people across this country showed to our state.”
The governor announced he is sending 100 ventilators to both New Jersey and Michigan and 50 to Maryland, states still struggling to flatten the rate of infections and deaths from the coronavirus.
China sent New York 1,000 ventilators last week after Cuomo warned he was running out of supplies. Earlier during the press conference, Cuomo announced all New Yorkers need to wear face coverings when going out in public.
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