Governor Andrew M. Cuomo on Monday described how New York State would apply the CDC’s seven metrics for re-opening, saying each region will have to meet all seven requirements before COVID-19 restrictions can be lifted in that area.
Re-opening may occur in each of those regions in four phases, with any change in the metrics acting as ‘circuit breakers’. Should the infection rate rise above 1.1, the latest initiated phase of re-opening will be scaled back.
A regional approach
Of the 10 regions around the state, about half (all upstate) meet five of the seven marks; the Long Island region meets just two, the fewest of any area.
Here’s the metrics each region must meet:
- A 14-day decline in the number of hospitalizations or under 15 new hospitalizations*
- A 14-day decline in hospital deaths or fewer than 5 deaths*
- New hospitalizations must be under 2 per 100,000 residents*
- Share of total hospital beds available must be not less than 30 percent
- Share of ICU beds available must be not less than 30 percent
- 30 per 1,000 residents tested monthly, according to a 7-day average of new tests per day
- At least 30 contact tracers per 100,000 residents
*according to a rolling 3-day average
Here is where Long Island and New York City stood as of Sunday (the latest date that complete numbers were available for):
- Long Island meets just two of the seven; number one and number six
- New York City meets three; the number one, number two and number six
None of the regions yet meets the minimum for contract tracing, but the governor said a program to hire and train contact tracers is underway, led by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
Which businesses do we open first?
“You open businesses first that are most essential and pose the lowest risk,” Cuomo said, describing four phases as follows:
- Construction, manufacturing and some retail with curbside pickup
- Professional services, retail, administrative support and real estate
- Restaurants, food services, accommodations
- Arts, entertainment, recreation and education
“Remember, density is not your friend here,” Cuomo said. “Large gatherings are not your friend. That’s where the virus tends to spread. That’s why those situations would be down at the end.”
No major change expected before May 15
Cuomo, who delivered his daily briefing from Rochester, said he had no immediate plan to substantively alter any of the orders in place through May 15 that keep non-essential workers at home. But when the order is due to expire, some work may resume in areas upstate.
Owners of businesses should spend time now reimagining “how they’re going to do business and get ready to protect their workforce, to change their physical environment to the extent they need to and to change their processes to make sure people can socially distance, people remain in a safe environment.”
“And that’s going to be up to businesses to come up with ways to reconfigure their workplace and their processes to make this work and that’s business by business. Government can say these are the standards but a business is going to figure out how to do that.”
The governor said that the number of hospitalizations, intubations and new coronavirus infections are down, but that the pace of change is slower than hoped for.
“You see that curve coming down,” he said, displaying a graph showing the rise and fall of COVID-19 infections since early March. “You see that mountain that we went up. Now we’re on the other side of the mountain. You start to see the shape of the mountain. Unfortunately the decline from the mountain is not as steep as the incline.”
The number of new cases had plateaued at about 900 per day statewide last week, but has come down to about 700 per day, Cuomo said.
Thanks to efforts of New Yorkers to abide by stay home orders, 100,000 fewer New Yorkers were hospitalized than they predicted, the governor said.
Still, 19,415 New Yorkers died of COVID-19 as of Sunday, including 226 who died from the day before.
“So, we’ve done great work at a tremendous cost and tremendous hardship,” he said. “We just have to remain vigilant and smart and competent going forward.”
