Cuomo: COVID-19 Apex in New York Happening Sooner, Higher Cases
Gov. Andrew Cuomo says the apex of the coronavirus pandemic is happening sooner in New York with much higher confirmed cases than expected.
"The apex is higher than we thought and the apex is sooner than we thought. That is a bad combination of facts," Cuomo said during a press conference on Tuesday.
Cuomo believes New York is 14 to 21 days away from this apex. He says the number of confirmed cases is going up at alarming rates and doubling almost every three days.
"That is a dramatic increase in the rate of infection," Cuomo said. "We haven't flattened the curve, the curve is increasing."
Cuomo said New York has secured 7,000 ventilators but is in desperate need of 30,000 more ventilators. He adds the state is experimenting on splitting a ventilator to between two people.
"What happens to New York, is going to happen to Californa, Washington State and Illinois," he said. "We are just getting it first."
Cuomo also said the state needs more hospital beds. The projected need was 110,000 hospital beds at the apex of this virus, but the rate of infection is increasing and the curve has increased, so new projections show New York may need 140,000 hospital beds.
"We are scaling hospital capacity as fast as humanly possible," Cuomo said. "I will turn this state upside down to get the hospital beds we need. We need federal help and we need the federal help now.
On Monday, Cuomo ordered every New York hospital to increase capacity by at least 50 percent, with hopes of increasing capacity by 100 percent. On Tuesday, he said even if every hospital doubles its capacity, New York would still be short of the 140,000 projected need.
Cuomo also confirmed more than 25,000 coronavirus cases in the state. About 3,000 of those cases are in hospitals and 23 percent of those hospitalized are in ICUs.