Jan 27, 2021
- We're slowly coming down from our holiday surge and the number of new cases and hospitalizations have decreased across the state. In response, we're making modifications to our micro-clusters. All Orange Zone restrictions, and some Yellow Zone restrictions, have been lifted statewide—including all cluster zones in Western New York. The Yellow Zones that remain are in Newburgh and in New York City (two in the Bronx, one in Queens, and one in Washington Heights). Yellow Zone restrictions, which include mandatory weekly testing of a portion of students and faculty at schools, remain in place in those zones. To be clear statewide limits remain the same—a 33 percent cap on gym occupancy, a limit on private gatherings of 10 people, a 50 percent cap of occupancy in retail establishments—and of course, masks are still required in public when social distancing is impossible to maintain. The improvement in the numbers is a testament to New Yorkers' hard work and diligence against the virus and we must keep it up.
Here's what else you need to know tonight:
1. Hospitalizations fell to 8,771. Of the 202,661 tests reported yesterday, 11,028, or 5.44 percent were positive. There were 1,558 patients in ICU yesterday, up 14 from the previous day. Of them, 1,027 are intubated. Sadly, we lost 170 New Yorkers to the virus.
2. As of 11am today, 96 percent of first doses allocated to the state have been administered. This represents 1,246,946 first doses administered of the 1,304,050 allocations received from the federal government. Second dose allocations are separately allocated so no one should worry about not being able to get a second dose if they have already received the first.
3. Additional cases of the UK variant have been identified in New York State. The new cases have been found in Long Island, New York City, Westchester, Saratoga, Tompkins, Niagara, Onondaga, Essex and Warren Counties, bringing the statewide total to 42 known cases.
4. The State extended a partnership with HelloFresh to deliver free meal kits to veterans and military families in New York. Since establishing this partnership in July 2020, HelloFresh has provided more than 200,000 nutritious meals to veterans and military families in New York City who are facing food insecurity due to COVID-19. Now, New York and HelloFresh are extending this collaboration through the second quarter of 2021, ensuring that veterans and military families in New York City will continue to receive these nourishing meals throughout the challenging months ahead. We thank HelloFresh for their partnership.
5. All residents of nursing homes participating in the federal Long Term Care Facility vaccination program have been offered the vaccine. To date, 72 percent of nursing home residents have been vaccinated. By February 7th, all staff at nursing homes will have been offered the vaccine. Nursing home residents who declined the vaccine on the first opportunity—perhaps wanting to wait until others had received the vaccine—will get additional chances to get the vaccine.
Tonight's "Deep Breath Moment": Central Park received an unexpected visitor today—a snowy owl. Spotting this species of owl is an extremely rare event. Snowy owls are common in the Arctic tundra, but not in New York City, and so bird-watchers marveled at the unusual sighting. Snowy owls migrate south in winter. Avid birder David Barrett speculated that this particular snowy owl mistook the park's baseball field for a sand beach.
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