More COVID-19 patients leaving hospitals than coming in in Nassau County, NY
Nassau County Executive Laura Curran says we can't procrastinate thinking about putting the economy back to work.
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Nassau County Executive Laura Curran said on “Fox & Friends” on Tuesday that based on the coronavirus data she has been following, she thinks her county, which is on Long Island, has reached a plateau.
“It really is time now to start thinking about how we come back to normal,” she said.
Curran said she has been paying attention to “the comparison between people who are leaving the hospital, COVID patients who are being discharged, and those coming in.”
“For eight days in a row now we’ve seen more leaving than new COVID patients coming in,” Curran said. “That tells me we are in a plateau and it really is time now to start thinking about how we come back to normal. That's what I'm hearing from my constituents.”
She added, “We can't procrastinate thinking about how we come back because this is taking a terrible economic toll.”
THE CORONAVIRUS OUTBREAK STATE BY STATE
She said there are 100,000 residents on Long Island who are currently unemployed.
“I'm talking to business leaders regularly who are in tears having to lay people off," Curran said. "People they know whose families are dependent on that paycheck.”
The coronavirus pandemic has paralyzed the nation’s economy with many businesses, except those considered essential, forced to close in an attempt to slow the spread. The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits swelled to 6.6 million earlier this month, bringing the number of applications for a three-week period to more than 16 million.
Nassau County, which is east of New York City, the epicenter of the outbreak, has reported more than 24,000 coronavirus cases and 910 deaths as of Tuesday, according to Johns Hopkins University. New York City reports more than 106,000 cases and 7,000 deaths.
Speaking at a news conference on Monday, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he is working on a plan to reopen the economy “in coordination with the other states that are in the area and doing it as a cooperative effort where we learn from each other and we share information and we share resources and we share intelligence.”
“People want to hear people in charge working together for the common good, coming up with solutions, putting politics, putting ego aside and working together for combating the health crisis and then, how do we begin to reopen?” Curran said reacting to Cuomo’s statements.
“Let's think about what reopens first and the fact that we are working together regionally, I think, is incredibly important.”
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She added that schools are an important part of getting the economy running again.
“If you’re talking about reopening schools, that's key to reopening commerce, reopening the economy, getting people back to work,” she said. “It has to be done in concert, but we can't procrastinate."
"We have to start putting plans into place now because life will find its balance, this crisis will end and we want to emerge from this stronger, not weaker,” she added.
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