Hospitalizations for Coronavirus Are Nearly Flat in N.Y., but 799 More Die

Despite mounting death tolls, the governors of New York, 
New Jersey and Connecticut all cited data that gave 
them cause for optimism.

Published April 9, 2020
Updated April 10, 2020, 12:27 a.m. ET



Wheeling a body to a refrigerator truck at Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center in Brooklyn on Thursday.
Credit...Stephanie Keith for The New York Times


Hospitalizations in New York are almost flat, 
but deaths keep rising.

As it has for several days, the story of the coronavirus in New York had 
two strands on Thursday: encouraging progress and devastating loss of life, 
Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo said.

In the past two weeks, 
the number of virus patients hospitalized has grown
more and more slowly, from over 20 percent a day at one point
to single-digit percent increases this week.

From Wednesday to Thursday, the number increased by 200, to 18,279, 
or just 1 percent.
If the trend were to continue, the number of people in hospitals 

would soon start to decline — 
a sign that the virus had passed its apex.

But the number of people dying of the virus continues to grow. The state recorded 
799 deaths from Wednesday to Thursday, another one-day high.

For the second straight day, Mr. Cuomo compared the toll of the virus to the 

Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, calling the virus a “silent explosion that ripples 
through society with the same randomness, the same evil that we saw on 9/11.”

As he has done repeatedly in recent days, Mr. Cuomo 
stressed that social distancing and other restrictions would 
continue to be enforced, because they were necessary to 
maintain the progress the state has made.

He also cautioned that New York might only be in the first wave 
of the pandemic. The state would probably have enough hospital beds 
and ventilators to treat virus patients if current trends hold, he said, 
but its resources would be insufficient if the most drastic projections 
about the outbreak were realized.

“Everybody is assuming, well, once we get through this, we’re done,” 
Mr. Cuomo said. “I wouldn’t be so quick to assume that. This virus has 
been ahead of us from day one.

The governor again emphasized that New York’s black and Hispanic communities 
were being hit the hardest by the virus, and he said that additional testing sites 
would be opened in predominantly black and Latino neighborhoods.

Here are the latest statistics from the governor’s morning briefing.:::

• Deaths in New York State: 799 since yesterday, for a new total of 7,067.
  
  
  
  
• Confirmed cases: 159,937 statewide, up 10,621 from 149,316, a 7 percent increase. In New York City: 87,028, up from 81,803.
  
  
  
  
• People hospitalized: 18,279 statewide, up by 200 from 18,079 Wednesday, an increase of 1 percent.
  
  
  
  
• In intensive care: 4,925, up 84 from 4,841 on Wednesday, a 2 percent increase.
  

The number of ventilated patients in 
New Jersey falls.


Outside Trinitas Regional Medical Center in Elizabeth, N.J., on Wednesday,
Credit...Bryan Anselm for The New York Times


Gov. Philip D. Murphy of New Jersey cited progress in the fight against 
the virus on Thursday even as he reported that another 198 people in 
the state had died.

The number of virus patients on ventilators dropped almost 2 percent, to 
1,551 from 1,576, from Wednesday to Thursday, an indicator that the 
curve of infection was flattening.

The death toll was New Jersey’s smallest in three days, although it 
was still the fourth highest  since the outbreak began. More people 
have died in New Jersey, 1,700, than in any other state besides New York.

Mr. Murphy also said the rate at which the number of confirmed virus 
cases was doubling in each of the state’s counties was beginning to slow.

“This is progress,” he said, showing a county-by-county 
map of new cases. “Our social distancing is in fact beginning 
to show effect here.”

The governor announced 3,748 new cases, pushing the total number 
in the state to 51,027. He said that as the number of new cases 
continued to rise, people had to keep following the order to stay at 
home and to wear masks when going to the grocery store.

“We have got to get to a plateau,” he said. 
“This is not a time for selfishness.”

Nearly 480 people were discharged from hospitals from Wednesday 
to Thursday, he said, including James Pruden, an emergency room 
doctor who contracted the virus in late March.

Mr. Murphy also announced new grace periods for people who had lost 
their jobs and could not pay their insurance premiums: 60 days for 
people unable to pay health and dental premiums and 90 days for 
those unable to pay home, auto, renter’s and life insurance premiums.

The number of new hospitalizations is 
flattening in Connecticut.

Gov. Ned Lamont of Connecticut, like his counterparts in New York 
and New Jersey, said there has been a relatively modest net gain in 
virus-related hospitalizations from Wednesday to Thursday. He called 
the data “good news” and a sign that “we may be reaching peak.”

Mr. Lamont reported that another 45 people had died of the virus — 
a one-day increase similar to those earlier in the week — but he spent 
more time focused on the increase of just 46 hospitalizations 
statewide since Wednesday.

Fairfield County, the area of Connecticut to be hit hardest by the pandemic 
and where the virus was first detected in the state, had experienced a slight decrease 
in new hospitalizations from Wednesday to Thursday, he added. 

Mr. Lamont nonetheless cautioned that “one day does not a trend make.” 

Still, he said he hoped that the figures on Thursday might portend positive 
developments in the future.

An inmate held on a parole violation died after 
catching the virus.



The release of about 400 parole violators from the Rikers Island jail complex has moved slowly, critics said.
Credit...Dave Sanders for The New York Times


Last summer, Raymond Rivera was arrested on a minor parole violation 
and sent to Rikers Island, where he waited months for a final decision on 
his release. As his case dragged on, the coronavirus spread through the 
jail complex and he became sick.

On Friday, state parole officials finally lifted the warrant against 
Mr. Rivera as he lay in a bed at the Bellevue Hospital Center.
 He died the next day.

“It was a tragedy the way it happened,” said Mr. Rivera’s wife, 
who asked not to be named to protect her privacy. 
“Why did he have to wait so long?”

Nearly two weeks ago, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo promised to 
release about 400 people who were on Rikers Island for minor 
parole violations as part of an effort to reduce the impact of the 
coronavirus in the city’s crowded jail complex.

“We’re releasing people who are in jails because they violated parole 
for nonserious reasons,” Mr. Cuomo said in a television interview on March 27. 
“And wherever we can get people out of jails, out of prisons, now we are.”

But carrying out that order has proved difficult, defense lawyers say. 

The state parole system has largely ground to a halt because of the pandemic, 
leaving hundreds of people in limbo, including those like Mr. Rivera who 
were detained on technical violations. So far 195 parole violators have been 
released from New York City jails, city officials say.

Retrieving bodies from homes is a 24-hour 
operation in N.Y.C.

Nearly 120 morgue workers and soldiers are working around the clock 
to retrieve the bodies of up to 280 people a day who are dying at home 
in New York City, many of them probably having succumbed to the 
coronavirus without being counted in the official death toll.

The chief medical examiner’s office is overseeing the grisly task, 
with the help of more than 100 soldiers from the U.S. Army, 
the National Guard and the Air National Guard, officials said. 
Many of those involved in the operation have special training 
in processing human remains.

Fifteen four-person teams are working during each 12-hour shift, 
driving mostly rented vans, said Aja Worthy-Davis, a spokeswoman 
for the medical examiner’s office.

Fire Department data shows that 1,125 patients were pronounced 
dead in their homes or on the street in the first five days of April, 
more than eight times the 131 deaths recorded during the 
same period last year.

Paramedics are not testing those they pronounce dead for the virus 
so it is almost impossible to say how many of the people were 
infected with it. Some may have been tested before they died and 
either were not admitted to hospitals or were sent home.

But the discrepancy between the number of people dying at home 
this year at the height of the epidemic compared with the number 
of those who died under such circumstances last  year suggests 
the virus was involved in many of the recent deaths.

“The driver of this huge uptick in deaths at home is Covid-19,” 
Mayor Bill de Blasio said on Thursday. “And some people are 
dying directly of it, and some people are dying indirectly 
of it, but it is the tragic ‘X’ factor here.”


FULL STORY HERE