Number of deaths in N.Y. drops overnight, as new hospitalizations continue at steady pace: Cuomo

The number of deaths because of the coronavirus dropped a little more than 14 percent across New York state overnight from Friday into Saturday, from 630 to 540, Governor Cuomo said Saturday afternoon.

It was the smallest number of overnight deaths the state has seen in a day since early April, and represents a 32 percent decrease in the overnight mortality rate from April 9, when the number of deaths from one day to the next peaked at 799.

The number of intensive care unit patients and the number of intubations also declined overnight, Cuomo said.

All of this may indicate the state has passed its plateau of new infections, and new cases are on the decline, according to the governor.

Cuomo noted, however, that the state still saw 2,000 new hospitalizations overnight, which, he said, was troubling.

In Nassau County, new hospitalizations declined for the third straight day, as did ICU cases and intubations, County Executive Laura Curran said Saturday afternoon.

Nassau has more than 28,000 confirmed cases of Covid-19, the county executive said. Many of them have resolved.

She also said hospital “discharges continue to be robust,” indicating the county, like the state, may be past the plateau.

“We become more eager and ready to reopen our society,” she said, adding the county must begin planning to reopen marinas, golf courses and beaches, including the county-owned Nickerson Beach in Lido.

She said a reopening strategy must be developed. “I do believe we can strike the balance” between opening up society and controlling new infections, particularly among the elderly and those with underlying medical conditions.

Curran spoke at length about a proposal now before the County Legislature to delay collection of school taxes that come due in May. She said the county must guarantee all school tax collections, meaning if the school districts come up short in their collections, then the county must provide the funding to the districts.

She said the county is hurting financially, as are all municipalities. Sales and property tax collections comprise 67 percent of the county’s more than $3 billion budget. Sales taxes have plummeted during the pandemic, starving the county of one of its two primary revenue sources, Curran said.

She worries about county employees, she said, and wants to ensure the county maintains its force of first responders, including police officers and medics.

The federal and state governments, she said, must step in to ensure the county has enough cash on hand to meet its financial obligations, including to its employees, so it can continue to provide essential services.

Cuomo said the key to reopening the economy is testing for Covid-19 so people can feel safe returning to work. The governor has asked New York’s 50 largest testing labs to increase their capacity. They have responded, he said, by saying they need more reagents, which are chemicals needed to analyze test results.

The federal government, Cuomo said, must do all in its power to get reagents to the states and to the labs. Right now, he said, most reagents are manufactured in China.