By Jessie Yeung, Brett McKeehan, Amy Woodyatt, Fernando Alfonso III and Amir Vera, CNN
From CNN's Chuck Johnston
The United States surpassed Italy on Saturday morning with the most reported deaths of any nation.
The United States is now reporting at least 18,860 coronavirus deaths, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.
Italy is reporting 18,849 coronavirus deaths, according to the university.
There were 783 deaths from the coronavirus across New York state Friday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Saturday at a press conference.
Cuomo said that while that is not the highest number the state has seen during this pandemic, it is consistent with the rest of the week.
"You can see that the number is somewhat stabilizing, but it is stabilizing at a horrific rate, Cuomo said. "These are just incredible numbers depicting incredible loss and pain."
About 101 people are in the ICU and 109 people have had intubations, he said.
A total of 8,627 people have died across the state from Covid-19, the governor added.
“We have kept politics out of this crisis,” Cuomo said, adding “I worked very hard to do that.”
“I have no personal politics...not running for anything. I’m governor of New York thank you, and that’s where I’m going to stay," he added.
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New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo says the number of coronavirus-related hospitalizations across the state "is continuing to flatten."
"The number of hospitalizations appears to have hit an apex and the apex appears to be a plateau. Which is what many of the models predicted, that it wasn't going to be a straight up and straight down. It was straight up, you hit the top number, plateau for a period of time, and that looks like what we are doing. The hospitalization rate is down, and that's important. We have more people getting infected still. We have more people going into the hospitals, but we have a lower number," Cuomo said at a press conference today.
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There are 237 members of the Chicago Police Department who have tested positive for coronavirus, interim Chicago Police Superintendent Charlie Beck said at a press conference Saturday morning.
“We have just over a thousand who are off sick for things which may be related to the virus but there is no way to tell at this point. That’s 8.2% of our workforce,” Beck told reporters. “As testing becomes more available, our count continues to climb.”
Officials also released the name of the second Chicago police officer to die of complications from the virus.
Sgt. Clifford Martin died on Friday after being hospitalized for about two weeks. Martin, a 25-year veteran of the department, left behind a wife and three children, two of whom are officers with the Chicago Police Department, Beck said.
From CNN's Tim Lister and Al Goodman
The Spanish government will distribute roughly 10 million masks to workers returning to their jobs beginning this week when restrictions on some workplaces, such as construction sites, will be relaxed.
Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska said the masks would be distributed at places like subway stations and other transport hubs by police officers or civil protection workers. Their use would be recommended but not required.
Health Minister Salvador Illa said the use of the masks would be useful especially when social distancing can’t be met.
Grande-Marlaska also announced that 1,700 police officers nationwide have been affected by Covid-19. At the same news conference, Illa said that just over 25,000 workers in the health sector had been infected since the virus hit Spain.
Grande-Marlaska said there had been "a slight increase" in the number of incidents where people had left their homes without reason. He said that on Good Friday, traffic was down 95% compared to normal and entry into Madrid and Barcelona was down 93%.
Illa repeated that the nationwide lockdown continues "at least" until April 26.
A constitutional lawyer says President Trump might not have the authority to completely reopen the country from restrictions put in place to help combat the coronavirus pandemic.
Page Pate, a criminal defense and constitutional attorney, told CNN that the Constitution and US Supreme Court interpretation does not give the President the authority to override governors' decisions.
"If we have a governor enact a particular restriction that's more restrictive than the President wants, of course the President can suggest that the governor not do that," Pate said. "But as far as coming in and telling a specific governor you've got to reopen your schools, you have to allow businesses to reopen, a president can only do that if the state restriction interferes with interstate commerce."
Some context: This insight comes after President Trump said Friday at the White House Coronavirus Task Force briefing that the decision to reopen the country's economy will be the "biggest decision" he's ever made.
Pate said although this is how the Constitution is interpreted, this particular issue has not played out in the courts before.
"If you look at the constitution, the president's responsibilities and authority ends with the federal government. He cannot control the individual states as far as specific local restrictions," he said.
From CNN's Sheena Jones
At least 343 homeless people have tested positive for Covid-19, according to a city official at the press conference with Mayor Bill de Blasio today.
About 20 of those individuals have died, the official said. So far, 37 homeless people have been discharged from the hospital, 139 are in isolation within the shelter system, 81 are still in the hospital and 35 are in self-isolation with their families, the official added.
From CNN's Melissa Alonso
Gov. Ron DeSantis is taking "advantage of this pause" in business to complete infrastructure projects in Florida, he said at a press briefing Saturday.
Having less people on Florida roads is an opportunity to make some progress on Orlando's I-4 "construction congestion," DeSantis said.
The $2.3 billion project aims to reconstruct 21 miles of the interstate in Central Florida, according to DeSantis.
On average, the interstate sees "well over 100,000 cars a day" but "now you're dealing with volumes that are probably 40,000," allowing for increased road closures without affecting as many people, Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) Secretary Kevin Thibault said.
DeSantis says the sped-up contract will increase day time operations and allow for longer hours. Thibault projects FDOT will be able to "get this work done in one to two months."
The president of Harvard University said he and his wife will be donating plasma to help combat the coronavirus.
Lawrence Bacow and his wife, Adele, tested positive for the virus on March 24.
Bacow said in a letter to the community that they have volunteered to participate in research at the Ragon Institute with the hope that their coronavirus antibodies can be used to create a therapeutic.
"We hope that something good can come from our close encounter with COVID-19," the statement said.
