July 13 coronavirus news

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he will soon issue an emergency health order that mandates that people traveling from high-risk states must give their contact information to local officials so the state can enforce the mandatory two-week quarantine.

People traveling to New York state by plane will get a contact form to fill out. If they leave the airport without turning it back in, they will receive a summons and a $2,000 fine. Those travelers may also be brought to a hearing and be forced to quarantine.

New York currently requires anyone traveling from a state with a high infection rate to quarantine for at least two weeks once they enter the state. Cuomo said there have been incidents of travelers coming to the state and not complying with the quarantine, causing outbreaks in communities.

Cuomo added that there are two threats to the state's success in battling coronavirus — people who do not comply with social distancing and other safety measures and outbreaks across the country, that could travel back to New York.

The governor said that because of these two new threats, state officials are adding two new factors to the list of considerations for reopening.

The state previously used three "gauges" on the "reopening valve": Diagnostic testing rate, antibody testing and hospitalization rates.

Cuomo said today that along with those three factors, the state will now also consider the effects of non-compliance and the effect of the national outbreak outside of New York.

Washington, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser announced that the District has seen four consecutive days with no coronavirus deaths.

The first DC resident died from coronavirus complications on March 20. Since then, at least 528 individuals have died from Covid-19.

This is the first time since then that the District has seen four consecutive days without a loss of life due to coronavirus.

This comes as coronavirus cases are still slightly trending up.

The city reported 59 new cases today, bringing the district’s overall positive case total to 10,906.

In order to enter phase three of reopening, Bowser has said Washington, DC needs to see 14 days of decreased cases.

The city made it 8 days, but spikes brought it back down to three. Currently, the city has seen 5 days of decreased cases.

As coronavirus cases continue to soar in Florida, Memorial Hospital West in Pembroke Pines, Florida, is past its ICU capacity, and the team is now “creating space at every inch of the building,” CEO Leah Carpenter says.

In an effort to manage the surge, the hospital has canceled all elective surgeries so it can redeploy staff in high priority areas, she added.

Carpenter says the team has the resources it needs right now but “if the surge continues, I have significant concerns about whether or not we’ll have what we need.”

She noted there are concerns about the availability ventilators, oxygen supply, dialysis equipment and personal protective equipment.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is offering to help other cities where coronavirus cases are rising, saying they should learn from what New York went through and follow the data and protocols that worked for the state.

Cuomo told Atlanta, Georgia, Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms "anything we can do we stand ready" at his daily news briefing on Monday.

"You have more than risen to the occasion," Cuomo said.

He pointed to the nurses and medical workers who came from across the country to help in New York hospitals when the state was hit hard by the virus, saying he wanted to "pay forward" that act of "generosity and love."

Cuomo offered to help Bottoms with setting up testing and other safety protocols.

Bottoms, who tested positive for Covid-19 at the beginning of July, talked about the situation in the city saying ICU bed capacity is full in some hospitals.

"We're headed in the wrong direction," she said.

"New York was able to get to the other side," she said, adding she was hopeful Atlanta would also get to the other side, but to do that, the city has to take actions and look at science and data.

WATCH:

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo laid out the state's criteria for schools to reopen in the fall across the state.

He said that for a region to reopen its schools, it must be in phase four of reopening and the daily infection rate must be below 5%, which means that "the virus is under control" and it is "safe to reopen," the governor said.

Cuomo said that "if the infection rate goes over 9%...that means the virus is moving rapidly" and if that happens, schools will be closed.

"That's the green light and that's the red light," Cuomo said about the formula the state is going to use.

The governor reiterated that the 700 school districts across the state are required to present their plan for reopening by the end of July.

Cuomo said, "we'll make the first decision" on who can reopen and how during the week of Aug. 1-7. "The day the school opens, we continue to monitor," he said.

Just like the state is coordinating its economic reopening, Cuomo said reopening schools is “purely on the numbers, it’s on the science.”

Maria van Kerkhove, the World Health Organization’s technical lead for coronavirus response, emphasized during a briefing Monday that the understanding of coronavirus transmission in children is still limited. 

The virus is less prevalent among young children, van Kerkhove said, while children about 10 and older appear to have about the same prevalence as young adults.

However, she pointed out that children can have severe disease, and children have died from Covid-19.

“They can be infected, which we’ve said from the beginning, but they do tend to have more mild disease,” she said. “In terms of transmission, there’s quite a lot that we still need to understand about transmission in children.”

In relation to schools reopening, van Kerkhove said that WHO has issued guidance on the safe running of schools and also on considerations of when schools should reopen and that there are a number of considerations that need to take place. 

These include transmission in the local area and the ability of the school structure to be able to implement measures like social distancing and hand washing. 

Van Kerkhove said they have heard of some outbreaks in schools, mainly among older children. 

The World Health Organization is warning countries against using school reopenings as “political footballs that get kicked around the place.”

During a Monday briefing, Dr. Mike Ryan, executive director of WHO's Health Emergencies Program, said “it's not fair on our children.”   

“The problem we have in some countries right now is that it's very difficult to determine the safety of any environment because there's just so much transmission going on, that all potential environments in which people mix are essentially problematic,” he added.  

Ryan said, “the fact remains that when community transmission exists and when community transmission is intense, children will be exposed to that virus, and children will be part of the transmission cycle.” 

The best way to reopen schools, Ryan said, is by lowering community transmission using a “comprehensive long-term strategy” that looks at “everything at one time.”

“We can't move from – let’s deal with the schools and then we will deal with that for a week or two, and then let's deal with the workplace, and then let's deal with infection and hospitals or long-term care facilities. This is playing whack a mole,” he said. "We got to chew gum and walk at the same time.”

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said that 10 more people have died from coronavirus in the state. He said, "we'd love to see that number at zero" but acknowledged it is a "very good place to be" compared to the daily death toll during the height of the pandemic.

The governor said New York tested more than 51,000 people yesterday and 557 were positive (1.08%). On the positivity rate, he said "it is all good news" in the state.

Cuomo noted that numbers have actually gone down in the state, despite fears that there would be an uptick after reopening. 

“The numbers show that what we have done in terms of our reopening strategy and plan has worked,” Cuomo said.

Earlier today, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that there had been no deaths in the city in a 24-hour period.

"Twenty four hours where no one dies, let’s have many more days like that,” de Blaiso said, calling the news "so striking and so moving."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on MSNBC Monday discussed the prospect of reopening schools in the coming months as the coronavirus pandemic surges around the country, raising fears about safety. 

In the interview, she said the “biggest concern is safety” and called for Congress to approve funding for schools to adjust to the pandemic, including broadband provisions for low income students to allow remote learning. 

“Without the resources, we shouldn’t even be thinking about sending them back to school,” Pelosi said.

She also reiterated her call for President Trump to implement the Defense Production Act to manufacture personal protective equipment.

Pelosi said effective testing is essential for the United States to move forward.

“There’s no use in taking a test if you’re not going to get your results until a week later,” she said.

Asked about the plight of American schoolchildren who face domestic abuse situations at home or who don’t have food security and rely on school to eat breakfast and lunch, Pelosi said addressing their needs is “something we have always fought for."

But, she added, “it’s not a question of balancing equities, it’s a question of crossing a threshold of safety.”