The rate of new coronavirus infections in New York is doubling about every three days, a “dramatic” increase that means the apex will be higher and sooner than anticipated, the state’s governor says.
“We haven’t flattened the curve, and the curve is actually increasing,” Gov. Andrew Cuomo told a news conference.
“The apex is higher than we thought and the apex is sooner than we thought,” he says, adding it could arrive in 14 to 21 days. “That is a bad combination of facts.”
New York has revised its estimated need of hospital beds from 110,000 up to 140,000.
The state currently has 53,000 hospital beds, Cuomo says.
The governor reiterates that there is a “critical and desperate need for ventilators,” saying the state has procured 7,000, but needs at least another 30,000.
He says the only way to get the devices, which could “make the difference between life and death” for some patients, is through the federal government.
“I do not for the life of me understand the reluctance to use the Defence Production Act,” Cuomo says, referring to a law that would allow President Donald Trump to order the private sector to produce goods.
Cuomo says health care workers in New York are resorting to an experimental procedure where they split one ventilators between two patients.
New York has 25,665 confirmed coronavirus cases, Cuomo says, almost ten times more than the second hardest-hit U.S. state, California.
