This is our daily update of the latest COVID-19 news for Thursday July 23, 2020. Previous daily updates It can be found hereand updated statistics are here.
New York is in Phase 4 of reopening now, what includes zoos, botanical gardens, and professional sports (no fans). A look at preparing for the spread of the coronavirus is here, and if you have lingering questions about the virus, here is our Regularly updated coronavirus faq. Here are some local and state hotlines for more information: NYC: 311; New York State Hotline: 888-364-3065; NJ State Hotline: 800-222-1222.
Here is the latest:
12:00 Amid widespread reports that some New Yorkers still face agonizing wait times for their COVID-19 test results, Mayor Bill de Blasio said Thursday that the problem had largely been “solved” thanks to a new strategy. innovative from local laboratories.
According to the mayor, the city now has the capacity to perform 50,000 tests daily, with an average response time of just two days before the results return. “Now he is improving a lot,” he said during his daily briefing.
The mayor’s rosy image comes as many city residents report waiting a week or more to receive their diagnoses, rendering the tests essentially useless to those who have already been infected with the virus.
I asked Mayor de Blasio about the delays in the greed tests again today. We have been waiting 17 days for the results of a family member.
The mayor says the national increase caused delays, but the city addressed them and the average wait time was reduced to 2 days. That seems hard to believe.– Emma G. Fitzsimmons (@emmagf) July 23, 2020
De Blasio acknowledged Thursday’s delays, which he blamed for an increase across the country in cases that overwhelmed laboratories used by the city.
But the problem, he said, was solved through a new strategy known as “pooling,” in which samples from multiple patients are pooled into a single test, allowing doctors to eliminate the entire group if the sample turns out. negative.
Quest Diagnostics, one of the largest commercial labs in the city, was cleared for the new strategy over the weekend. Previously, the laboratory reported an average of seven days to return results to patients.
The bundling method has already cut the city’s wait times in half since last week, according to health officials.
“It was working overwhelmingly until we found this technical problem,” the mayor said of the city’s testing regime. “But now we are telling you that in many ways that has been resolved and people can trust better response times, especially if they go to NYC Health & Hospitals.”
@NYCHealthSystem what’s the point of mass testing if it takes almost two weeks to get your results back? It’s been 9 days and I haven’t recovered my results!
– Jay (@pessimistbyday) July 9, 2020
Dr. Ted Long, who oversees the city’s Corps of Evidence and Tracing, announced Thursday that the program had identified more than 17,000 cases across the city and prevented approximately 5,000 new infections. Sixty-four percent of the calls by trackers have completed the intake process and are being monitored, about ten percent less than the target, he said.
Dr. Long also addressed reports of excessive wait times, which he called “unacceptable.”
“There are still some labs that are not yet using clustering, where their response times are much, much higher,” Long acknowledged. “It is true that there is a lot of variation.”
Unemployment claims in the United States rise after months of decline
Last week, an additional 1.4 million workers were added to the nation’s unemployment charts, marking the first time that the weekly total grew in more than three months.
Over the past two weeks, the number of new jobless claims has reached around 1.3 million.
Economists have been preparing to increase unemployment as companies across the country have been forced to close again due to virus outbreaks and employers are running out of federal funds earmarked for payroll costs.
Betsey Stevenson, a professor of economics at the University of Michigan who has closely watched unemployment trends, warned that the latest data is a sign that the economy will not recover as quickly as some, including President Donald Trump, said it would do.
“Weekly UI claims show a disturbing pattern of increasing permanent job losses and slowing layoff withdrawals,” he tweeted.
Weekly UI claims show a disturbing pattern of increasing permanent job losses and slowing layoff withdrawals. The next employment report is likely to show a large increase in permanent job loss.
– Betsey Stevenson (@BetseyStevenson) July 23, 2020
In New York, the number of new claims filed last week was more than 88,000, a decrease of approximately 3,000 from the previous week. But the number of people currently receiving benefits increased by 21,000 to 1.54 million, an indication that job gains are being offset by continued job losses.
In contrast, many states have seen the total group of unemployed drop in recent weeks. In New Jersey, for example, the count of people who received unemployment benefits last week was more than 474,000, a decrease of almost 17,000 from the previous week.
Thursday’s report comes at what many experts say is a critical time for workers and the economy: An extra $ 600 a week in unemployment benefits intended to supplement state unemployment benefits is slated to end this week.
Republican lawmakers have been at a standstill on whether to extend the benefit. Opponents of the plan, including Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, have argued that the extra money discourages people from returning to work.
But some economists have rejected that idea, saying it prioritizes employers’ prospects.
I’m not sure, for example, employers have the most reliable perspective on the ranking order of factors like wages, workplace safety, childcare, and emergency UI in their hiring difficulties.
– Ernie Tedeschi (@ernieyeschi) July 23, 2020
