This week's coronavirus testing of Buffalo Bills fans ahead of Saturday's playoff game resulted in a positive test rate of 1.9%, state officials said Saturday morning.
There were 137 positive cases among 7,165 tests administered in drive-thru testing at Bills Stadium, Gareth Rhodes, a member of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo's Covid-19 Response Task Force, said during the governor's phone briefing Saturday morning.
The 1.9% rate is far lower than current regional or state rates. Through Thursday's testing, the seven-day average for Erie County was 7.2%, the Western New York region's was 8.6% and the statewide rate was 7.9%.
Public health authorities, including the World Health Organization, recommend maintaining a positive rate under 5%.
"So far all the reports are that it has gone extraordinarily smooth," Rhodes said of the testing, "and people are excited for the game."
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Rhodes said there were "30 lanes of drive-thru testing to get this done at rapid pace."
Cuomo opened the 11:30 a.m. call by saying he wanted to get through it quickly in order to be ready for the Bills' 1 p.m. game, and he closed the briefing by saying: "Bet on the Bills."
The governor said a state one-day record of 258,000 coronavirus tests were conducted Friday, which yielded 16,943 positive cases. The resulting statewide positivity rate was 6.6%, down from 7.7% for Thursday. The state's seven-day average rate is 7.7%.
Cuomo said there were 188 coronavirus deaths Friday statewide. He said hospitalization metrics were down, with the amount of coronavirus patients in hospitals down 34 to 8,527; ICU patients down 34 to 1,400 and intubations down 36 to 876.
The governor said Western New York's positivity rate through Friday was 8.4%, in the middle of the 10-region pack where Hudson Valley has the highest at 10.6%.
In other updates from the governor Saturday:
• Cuomo said that three more cases of the new "UK strain" of the coronavirus have been found in New York State. Two cases are associated with the original case found in Saratoga; another is a man in Nassau County, Long Island.
• The governor said that 543,000 doses of the vaccine have been given and distribution numbers continue to improve. He said the first three weeks saw 33,000; 102,000; and 148,000 doses distributed. This week, 259,000 vaccines were given as of Saturday morning. Cuomo said "we did a full-court press" this past week.
