UAlbany remains open for classes as it counts fewer than 100 COVID-19 cases in two weeks
Enterprise file photo — Michael Koff
UAlbany students will be able, for now at least, to continue to take in-person classes since the university reported just 73 COVID-19 cases on campus in the two-week period ending on Friday, Sept. 25. One-hundred cases would have triggered remote learning for two weeks.
ALBANY COUNTY — Eleven of the 18 new COVID-19 cases reported Friday morning by the Albany County Executive’s Office came from the University at Albany.
The state requires campuses that have more than 100 cases in a two-week period to move to remote teaching for two weeks.
The SUNY COVID-19 Tracker set up to monitor cases on the state’s 64 university and college campuses reported on Friday evening, Sept. 25, the last day of a two-week period that began on Sept. 12, that UAlbany had 73 cases.
However, the total number of cases that the county executive reported each day since Sept. 12 as being from UAlbany is well over 100.
The state is counting cases in discrete two-week periods, rather than in rolling two-week periods, which Albany County Health Commissioner Elizabeth Whalen said would make more sense from both an epidemiological and logical point of view.
Whalen said earlier that UAlbany continues to have a “low number of cases on campus compared to overall cases.” The county’s health department is tallying the cases of students, staff, or faculty who work or live or attend classes on campus.
The tracker shows that, since Aug. 28, UAlbany has had an estimated 120 total positive cases. It also shows that, as of Friday evening, 64 of the 230 rooms set aside for students under quarantine are in use.
As of Friday morning, McCoy’s office announced, Albany County has 2,894 confirmed cases. Of the new positive cases, 14 had close contact with someone infected with coronavirus disease 2019, one reported out-of-state travel, one is a healthcare worker or a resident of congregate settings, and two did not have a clear source of infection detected at this time.
Currently, 895 county residents are under quarantine, up from 884 on Thursday. The five-day average for new daily positives remained unchanged at 14.4. There are now 90 active cases in the county, down from 93 on Thursday.
So far, 11,812 county residents have completed quarantine. Of those who completed quarantine, 2,804 of them had tested positive and recovered.
For the fifth consecutive day, Albany County has had no new hospitalizations for COVID-19 patients. The number of county residents currently hospitalized due to the virus decreased to seven from eight, and the hospitalization rate decreased to 0.24 percent from 0.27 percent on Thursday.
The county’s COVID-19 death toll remains at 134.
Statewide, Governor Andrew Cuomo reported on Friday, 0.95 percent of Thursday’s COVID-19 tests were positive.
In the Capital Region, of which Albany County is a part, the positivity rate was 0.7 percent.
Four of the state’s 10 regions had a rate at 1 percent or higher: Long Island, Mid-Hudson, New York City, and Western New York. The North Country, as usual, was lowest, at 0.1 percent.
