Western New York's 11-day run as the New York region with the highest percentage of positive tests ended with Monday's results, but officials aren’t signaling all clear.
The state’s expanded rapid testing is scheduled through today, though appointments for the tests appear to be all booked with a couple of exceptions. Aside from the number of positive Covid-19 test results, officials aren’t saying where people were infected or if there are signs of emerging hot spots. For people who tested positive, county contract tracers should be pursuing everyone they encountered.
Local officials were a little defensive about Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s suggestion that they should do more.
The Erie County Health Department "is doing everything it can to enforce regulations, including shutting down establishments, unlike other counties,” said Peter Anderson, spokesman for Erie County Executive Mark C. Poloncarz. “Also, we continue to promote and counsel safe social distancing, masking, regular hand washing and sanitizing and staying away from large gatherings."
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Said Niagara County Sheriff Michael J. Filicetti: "We’re responsive to complaints, we’re responsive to PAUSE hotline complaints. I have had no further direction on anything that needs to be changed."
Cuomo, who did not meet with reporters Tuesday, renewed his call during a briefing Monday for "a real alert" in Western New York to tamp down the uptick in Covid cases.
The eight rapid testing sites, which the state opened Saturday from Lockport to Dunkirk, were scheduled to close Wednesday. The Buffalo News made several calls to the appointment line Tuesday morning and were told that appointments in Western New York are no longer available.
The unavailability of tests is not a surprise considering the tests have been scheduled on a first-come, first-served basis for the five-day run, Saturday through Wednesday. The governor's office, however, Tuesday reminded Western New Yorkers that rapid testing was available at the eight sites. A state customer service representative said that it may be possible for appointments to become available if there are cancellations, but only if the state is notified of those cancellations well before the appointments are scheduled. Several slots had been added to the True Bethel Baptist Church location in Buffalo and the Dunkirk site, with availability from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesday.
The New York region with the highest percentage of positive tests Monday was the Mohawk Valley.
Local officials said Tuesday they are doing all they can to enforce state Covid-19 policies.
"We’ve not received anything from them in that regard," Niagara County Public Health Director Daniel J. Stapleton said. “The public has been doing a great job of following the rules, but we’re all saying we can do better, and I think that’s what the governor’s saying.”
"Our department has been working steadily to expand and improve all aspects of our Covid-19 response," Erie County Health Department spokeswoman Kara Kane said.
She said the department has hired more contact tracers to find out who Covid-19 patients came near and more public health sanitarians to enforce the virus-related rules as well as continuing its regular inspections.
The county also has expanded testing capacity at its laboratory and partnered with Kaleida Health for testing among farm workers.
Kane said Erie County is working with schools and colleges "to identify and quarantine close contacts of confirmed cases quickly."
Next week's reopening of schools, at least for some with in-person classes, elevates the risk level for spread of the virus, Stapleton said.
"We’re all saying we need to increase our vigilance with schools opening up," he said.
Stapleton said the rapid testing sites are merely speeding up the reporting of new cases that probably would have been added to the statistics within a few days anyway.
“Those are people who would have been tested in some other way and maybe we would have gotten them in 5 or 10 days," Stapleton said. "I don’t think the total number of positives overall is going to increase.”
“What we all look at is the daily infection rate," the Niagara County health chief said. “If you look at what our last four days have been, we’re around that 1%, which is what we all hope for. We had a week or two when we were consistently below 1%, or maybe in a 14-day period we had one day when we were above (1%). Our numbers have been really strong.”
For Western New York, Monday's 1.6% positive testing figure was the same as Saturday and a decrease from 2% on Sunday.
The regional figure included results from all testing sites. The state did not release a breakdown of results from the eight temporary sites, where results are available in 15 minutes.
Statewide, nearly 77,000 tests were administered Monday and 754, or 0.98%, were positive. Of those cases, 75 were in Erie County, eight in Niagara County, 11 in Chautauqua County, one in Cattaraugus County and none in Allegany County, adding 95 in all to the total for Western New York, as defined by state officials.
Three deaths from the virus were reported in the state Monday, including one in Erie County.
The state's overall positive rate has remained under 1% for 25 consecutive days, and the number of Covid-19 patients in intensive care units Monday was 109, the lowest since March 15.
The total number of hospitalized patients was 432, up 14 from Sunday. The number of patients on ventilators was 54 Monday, an increase of three.
Also Tuesday, Cuomo announced rules for farm activities such as corn mazes, hayrides, haunted houses and U-pick fruit and vegetable farms.
All may reopen with mandatory mask wearing by visitors, social distancing among parties and reduced capacities. Hayride operators must clean and sanitize frequently touched surfaces between rides.
Cuomo also placed Alaska and Montana on the list of states from whom visitors or returnees must quarantine for 14 days upon arrival in New York.
The quarantine list now includes 30 states, plus the Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico and Guam. The nearest states to New York on the quarantine list are Indiana and Virginia.
New York adds states to the list when their positive test rate is higher than 10 per 100,000 residents over a seven-day rolling average or an area has a 10% or higher positivity rate over a 7-day rolling average.
