| NY Coronavirus:
'We Could Be On The Plateau' NEW YORK — Downstate New York could be at or very near the apex of its new coronavirus outbreak, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said at his Sunday news briefing. "The apex could be a plateau and we could be on the plateau right now," he said. "The next few days will tell." Evidence that the outbreak may have peaked: the number of people released from the hospital has been rising, and in particular the total number of new hospitalizations is much lower. ICU admissions are also down. But it will take more than a couple of days of numbers to accurately depict a trend, he said. With more than 300,000 people tested in New York as of Sunday morning, 122,031 had tested positive. Locally, there were 14,398 cases in Nassau County, 13,723 in Westchester; 12,405 in Suffolk; 5,326 in Rockland; 3,102 in Orange and 1,077 in Dutchess. There were 67,551 cases confirmed in New York City. The number of deaths rose to 4,159 as of Sunday morning. The number of new deaths has not climbed sharply in the past three days. As a percentage, Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester and Rockland counties have the most hospitalizations for what's officially known as COVID-19 after New York City. On Saturday, Cuomo said the state could reach the height of its outbreak in four to eight days. On Sunday, while he is less worried about hospital beds with the temporary federal hospital at the Javits Center becoming available, he said shortages of staff and equipment are big problems. "The system is over-capacity all across the board," he said. Trying to manage that with the same or fewer resources puts everyone and everything under a tremendous stress, "but life is options and we don't have any." The federal government is deploying 1,000 doctors, nurses and respiratory technicians, he said. The first 325 coming in Sunday will be sent to New York City's public hospitals, which are the most stressed. The "surge-flex" process allows public health officials to swiftly deploy resources to the hardest-hit parts of New York's health care system, he said, likening it to firefighters concentrating first on one hot spot and then moving to the next. "We will come to a point where that wave will run right through the state, and we're going to have to do it for Albany, Rochester, Syracuse, the North Country," he said. "I guarantee the people of this state we won't lose a life if we can prevent it. We're not going to lose a life because we didn't share resources among ourselves." When cases climb in western New York, resources will be shifted there, he said. "If I have to get in the truck and drive it from Montauk Point to Buffalo it'll be there ... that was our mentality post 9/11 ... and that's how we'll be going forward." Cuomo said he talks to hospital administrators across the state every day about how to share equipment when they're all worried about having enough. "I know I'm asking them to do really difficult things," he said. "All I can say is thank you ... thank you to the front line workers. These people are true heroes." | 