ALBANY COUNTY — Another county resident — a man in his sixties — has succumbed to COVID-19, bringing Albany County’s death toll from the virus to 346.

Daniel McCoy, the county’s executive, made the announcement in a Tuesday morning release, noting it was the county’s first reported COVID-19 death since Feb. 17.

McCoy also announced he has signed a law that makes it unlawful for third-party online food-delivery services to charge more than 15 percent of the original purchase price for food delivery.

It is now unlawful in Albany County to have fees of more than 5 percent of the purchase price for marketing.

Third-party companies can be met with civil action to enforce the protections, and local restaurants can seek damages and injunctive relief.

The law, which was passed unanimously by the county legislature on Feb. 8, will stay in effect as long as the emergency restrictions remain on on-premises dining.

More variant cases

Also on Tuesday, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced that 18 new cases of B.1.1.7 — the highly transmissible COVID-19 variant first identified in the United Kingdom — have been confirmed in New York State.

This brings the state’s total of known B.1.1.7 cases to 154.

Cuomo also announced that a second case of the variant first identified in South Africa, known as B.1.351, has been confirmed in Nassau County on Long Island.

Cuomo had announced the first Nassau County case on Feb. 21, following a B.1.351 case the week before of a Connecticut resident who was having a procedure done in a New York City hospital.

The B.1.351 variant was first confirmed in the United States in January, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“This variant was first identified in Nelson Mandela Bay, South Africa, in samples dating back to the beginning of October 2020,” reports the CDC, and also says, “Currently there is no evidence to suggest that this variant has any impact on disease severity.”

Of the potential consequences of emerging variants, the CDC says the ability to evade vaccine-induced immunity “would likely be the most concerning because once a large proportion of the population is vaccinated, there will be immune pressure that could favor and accelerate emergence of such variants by selecting for ‘escape mutants.’”

However, the report goes on, “There is no evidence that this is occurring, and most experts believe escape mutants are unlikely to emerge because of the nature of the virus.”

According to a CDC webpage reporting variants for COVID-19 in the United States, as of Tuesday evening, there are 46 cases of B.1.351 in the nation across 14 states.

For the B.1.1.7 variant, the CDC reports 1,881 cases across 41 states, again as of Tuesday evening. This includes just 136 cases in New York, meaning the latest cases reported by Cuomo on Tuesday morning had not yet been included.

Two of the new B.1.17 cases were of asymptomatic teenagers in Albany County, living in a congregate facility, the county’s health commissioner said on Monday.

According to the not-yet-updated CDC page, Florida has the most B.1.1.7 cases, at 489, followed Michigan at 210, California at 204, New York at 136, and Georgia at 119.

Newest numbers

As of Tuesday morning, Albany County has had 20,088 confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 43 new cases since Monday, according to McCoy’s release.

Of the new cases, 34 did not have clear sources of infection identified, six had close contact with someone infected with the disease, and three were health-care workers or residents of congregate settings.

The five-day average for new daily positives has decreased to 66.4 from 71. There are now 519 active cases in the county, down from 569 on Monday.

The number of county residents under quarantine decreased to 1,401 from 1,519. So far, 62,786 residents have completed quarantine. Of those, 19,569 had tested positive and recovered. That is an increase of 90 recoveries since Monday.

There were two new hospitalizations overnight, and there are now 60 county residents currently hospitalized from the virus – a net decrease of two. There are currently seven patients in intensive-care units, down from eight yesterday.

Currently, 166 Capital Region residents are hospitalized with the disease, which is 0.02 percent of the population and leaves 35 percent of the region’s hospital beds available, according to a Tuesday release from the governor’s office.

Statewide, 0.03 percent of New Yorkers are hospitalized with COVID-19, leaving 36 percent of the state’s hospital beds available.

Currently, 185 of the Capital Regio’s 236 ICU beds are filled, leaving 25 percent available.

Statewide, 28 percent of ICU beds are available.

As of Monday, as a seven-day average, the Capital Region had an infection rate of 1.99 percent. Statewide, the infection rate is 3.46 percent.

The highest rate is in New York City at 4.49 percent. The lowest rate is in the Southern Tier, at 0.69 percent.

The infection rate for Albany County, as of Monday, as a seven-day rolling average, was 1.6 percent, according to the state’s dashboard.

New York State is in its 10th week of getting vaccine doses from the federal government and has so far received 3.9 million doses.

The Capital Region has administered 214,603 of the 243,080 doses it has received this week, which is 88 percent.

Statewide, 89 percent of doses have been administered so far this week.