New York State has lowest transmission rate for COVID-19 of any state in the nation
— Photo from the Albany County Executive’s Office
The New York National Guard members stationed in Albany County have moved on to another mission as COVID-19 cases have leveled off. In partnership with the county’s Veterans Service Bureau, they delivered more than 5,600 boxes of food to county residents placed under quarantine. Between March 31 and June 5, more than 1,500 households received a delivery with 35 to 50 pounds of food in each box donated by the Regional Food Bank of Northeastern New York.
ALBANY COUNTY — On Friday, both the governor and the Albany County executive urged residents to continue to get tested for COVID-19.
New York State has the lowest rate of transmission — .77 — of any of the 50 states, Governor Andrew Cuomo said at his Friday press briefing.
“When it comes to the reopening, the number for us to watch now is the daily testing number,” he said. About 50,000 New Yorkers are getting tested each day, Cuomo said, to “tell you immediately what’s happening with the infection rate.” He reported that 1.1 percent of Thursday’s COVID-19 tests were positive.
Over the last few months, Cuomo has daily reported on the number of hospitalizations and deaths from the coronavirus 2019 but is now shifting his focus.
“You see states all across the nation where the infection rate is going up dramatically. You have states now that reopened that are scaling back their reopening,” said Cuomo. “That’s how bad the spikes are.”
Cuomo said that New York State, which was the epicenter for the disease with the most residents infected and the most deaths, is now “the exact opposite.”
He went on about the infection rate, “Since we’ve reopened, the number has continued to go down, believe it or not … because we’ve been disciplined in our reopening, and that’s what we have to continue to do.”
Cuomo referenced a website — rt.live —where the founders of Instagram now track the rate of transmission in states across the nation. “New York State, the lowest rate of transmission, meaning the virus is spreading at the lowest rate in the State of New York, of every state in America, that is incredible,” he said.
According to the website, Rt, a key measure of how fast the virus is growing, is the average number of people who become infected by an infectious person. If Rt is above 1.0, the virus will spread quickly. When Rt is below 1.0, the virus will stop spreading.
On June 12, the site reported an Rt for New York State of .77, the lowest in the nation, and of 1.15 for Washington State, the highest.
Cuomo also reported that 42 more New Yorkers had died of the disease since his press briefing the day before. “You see the overall trend on this is down, and the numbers are probably at such a low level that I don't know if they'll drop much more than where we are,” he said.
Albany County Executive Daniel McCoy reported on Friday morning that an Albany County woman in her 90s had died the day before of COVID-19, bringing the county’s death toll from the disease to 118.
“The virus is still here, people. It hasn’t gone away,” said McCoy.
He also reported that the test results had come back for all but five or six of the 78 protesters and first responders who had been tested for COVID-19 on June 4.
“All of them came back negative, which is good,” said McCoy. “It means you had your mask on and were doing the right stuff.”
He urged county residents, “Please get tested.”
The county, working with the Whitney M. Young Jr. Health Center, set up mobile walk-up testing sites in at-risk neighborhoods.
McCoy said he had reached out to legislators and ministers to encourage use of the sites.
“We need to get the numbers up,” he said.
Residents wishing to be tested at one of the walk-up sites may call 518-465-4771 for an appointment.
The state continues to run its drive-through testing facility at the uptown University at Albany campus. The number to call for an appointment there is: 1-888-364-3065.
Rite Aid in Colonie also runs a testing site as does Priority 1 Urgent Care in Guilderland, which also does antibody testing.
Criteria for testing has been expanded to include not just those with symptoms or those exposed to COVID-19 patients but also anyone who is returning to work or has been at a mass gathering.
Albany County now has 1,819 confirmed cases of COVID-19 with 458 people under mandatory quarantine and five under precautionary quarantine. The five-day average for new daily positive cases is now at 5.4.
So far, 5,158 county residents have completed quarantine, with 1,567 of them having tested positive and recovered.The recovery rate for the county now stands at 86.14 percent.
Eleven Albany County residents with COVID-19 are currently hospitalized, bringing the hospitalization rate to 0.6 percent.
