ALBANY COUNTY — Five more county residents have died of COVID-19 since Wednesday, Albany County Executive Daniel McCoy reported at the start of his press conference Thursday morning.

He noted that he had announced 15 COVID deaths in just one week. He also reported 137 new cases and another record number of hospitalizations — 90 county residents are currently hospitalized with the disease.

“It’s only going to get worse for a while before it gets better,” said McCoy.

He noted that, although New York State is slated to get its first 170,000 doses of a COVID-19 from Pfizer on Dec. 15, those will be used for frontline health-care workers and for nursing-home residents.

“It is critical that this vaccine goes to our most vulnerable residents and populations that were hit the hardest,” he said.

On Wednesday, the American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living sent a letter to the National Governors Association, urging states to first distribute COVID-19 vaccine first to all long-term care facilities, nursing homes, and assisted-living communities.

The letter notes that more than 100,000 long-term-care residents in the United States have died from COVID-19, and nursing homes are now experiencing the worst outbreak of new cases since last spring with more than 2,000 residents succumbing to this virus each week.

“A one-month delay in administering the vaccine at long term care facilities could cost more than 10,000 of our residents their lives. The speed of which states can vaccinate our residents has significant life or death consequences,” says the letter to the governors.

States are charged with vaccine distribution and Governor Andrew Cuomo has already said that the non-binding recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention coincides with the priorities outlined in the plan New York drafted in October. 

McCoy said it could take until May, June, or even September until enough New Yorkers are vaccinated to make a return to normal life possible.

“People are going to start to feel more liberated,” he said, gathering and not wearing masks.

Albany County’s health commissioner, Elizabeth Whalen, had a similar message.

“Although this is the beginning of a light, for the general public there’s likely a much longer delay for when vaccine will be available and, until vaccine is taken by the majority of people, it will not be protective for the community at large,” she said.

Whalen urged residents not to plan the usual gatherings and parties for Christmas.

“It’s not going to get better in any likelihood between now and Christmas,” she said. “It’s likely that we will continue to see cases increase and that they will result in increased hospitalizations and unfortunately increased deaths in the county.

“The only way we can prevent this from happening is from individual behavior,” said Whalen, stressing that in-home gatherings with anyone but immediate family are a risk.

“We believe our friends won’t harm us,” she said, noting that many people with the disease are asymptomatic and can spread it unwittingly.

“We are seeing cases … across all facets of the community ...,” said Whalen. “Your risk is high every time you walk out the door.”

She also urged residents to cancel travel plans.

“Across the country, we’re seeing hospitals hit their surge and that is what we really want to avoid,” said Whalen.

Zones

McCoy noted that the county’s infection rate for Dec. 1, on a seven-day rolling average, was 4.7 percent.

“Our daily percent-positive rate hit an alarming 6.4 on Tuesday, which drove up our average ...,” he said. “This is now the third day in a row our percent positive was above 4 percent, which technically would put us past yellow into orange.”

Under the state’s original system for designating micro-cluster zones of infection, Albany County would have needed 10 consecutive days with a seven-day rolling average of 3 percent or higher to be in a yellow precautionary zone, or of 4 percent or higher to be placed in an orange warning zone.

The metrics for determining micro-cluster zones, however, is being changed under Governor Andrew Cuomo’s winter plan, and the specifics have not yet been released. The metrics will involve death and hospitalization rates as well as hospital capacity and staffing.

“We’re still waiting on guidance for the micro-cluster zones,” said McCoy on Thursday.

Hospitalizations

Albany County saw 15 new hospitalizations overnight, McCoy said, calling it alarming. He noted 90 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 on Thursday was more than double a week ago.

He also again stressed it’s “not just older people who are hospitalized.”

Currently, McCoy reported, one county resident under 25 is hospitalized, 15 are between the ages of 25 and 49 while 37 are between the ages of 50 and 74, and 37 are older than 75.

Fourteen county residents are now in intensive-care units, which McCoy noted is the highest since April 13 when there were 16.

He said, although more people are being hospitalized, their stays are shorter and fewer need ventilators.

McCoy also pointed out that, on Wednesday, the United States hit an all-time high for hospitalizations, at over 100,000.

“The CDC is now predicting that the next three months will be the worst we’ve ever seen,” he said of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

He concluded, “We still haven’t seen the full effects of Thanksgiving … I’m trying to brace everyone for the worst-case scenario … You can help us do our job if you do the right thing.”

Newest numbers

Statewide, the positive testing rate, based on Wednesday’s test results, is 4.84 percent, which includes the 5.91 percent from all micro-cluster zones, Cuomo announced on Thursday.

He also noted that, based on metrics from Johns Hopkins, New York is among the state’s with the lowest positivity rate, following Vermont, Maine, and Hawaii.

The Capital Region, of which Albany County is a part, had a positivity rate of 3.90 percent.

Of the state’s 10 regions, the Southern Tier continues to have the lowest rate, at 2.59 percent, while Western New York continues to have the highest, at 7.41 percent. 

As of Thursday morning, Albany County has 6,160 confirmed cases of COVID-19, McCoy announced.

Of the 137 new cases, 13 had close contact with someone infected with the disease, 118 did not have a clear source of infection identified at this time, and six are health-care workers or residents of congregate settings.

The five-day average for new daily positives increased to 131.6 from 117.6. There are now 910 active cases in the county, up from 904 yesterday. The number of people under mandatory quarantine rose to 2,239 from 2,181.

So far, 24,509 county residents have completed quarantine. Of those, 5,250 had tested positive and recovered.

The five county residents who succumbed to COVID-19 on Wednesday included a man in his fifties who wasn’t a resident of a nursing home. The other four were residents of group settings: A man in his seventies; a man and a woman in their eighties; and another woman in her nineties.

Albany County’s COVID-19 death toll now stands at 166.