After Governor Andrew Cuomo harshly criticized New York City for the slowness in which they are getting vaccines against COVID – 19 , and threaten to impose fines on hospitals of up to $ 100, 03, if they do not administer the vaccines they have for the end of this week, Mayor Bill de Blasio made a call to work together and seek more effective mechanisms. When figures show that of all the vaccines in their possession only have been applied on 31% , the local president asked the State and the federal government to grant the City freedom to vaccinate.
“We need to hear from our healthcare leaders and our healthcare workers who are saying, give us the flexibility to vaccinate more and more people, let us have the ability to do our job in the right way, give them the freedom to vaccinate and they will vaccinate thousands, tens of thousands, then hundreds of thousands, then millions, “said the mayor. “What they don’t need is more bureaucracy. What they don’t need is the threat of fines . Why don’t we stop talking about fines and start talking about the freedom to vaccinate, letting the professionals do their job? So, we are going to move with all the speed, capacity, creativity, flexibility imaginable to do what we can, but we need the help of the state government. We need help from the federal government. ”
In that vein, the leader of the Big Apple announced a plan to increase the speed of the vaccination program, with the adaptation of service points 24 hours throughout the city , but insisted that the State should give him the green light.
“We are going to take a next step in our effort beyond hospitals and clinics and sites that we have already established, around of 125 sites in New York City, reaching around 160 this week. We are going to start a new type of site, a mass vaccination site, ”said the Mayor. “We want to create public sites where anyone in the appropriate categories can come the 24 hours a day, seven days a week and get vaccinated. They will be in the five boroughs “.
The boss of the Big Apple warned that the City has the capacity and the personnel to move forward more quickly in the vaccination plan.
“And I’m thinking particularly of people older than 064 years and of course I’m thinking of all essential workers, public workers, first responders, educators, but also the grocery store workers, the people who have been with us through this crisis… I want it to be easy for everyone to get vaccinated, ”he said. “With the support of the State, with the approval of the State, we can move that in a matter of days and open a completely new front.”
The Mayor stated that they will announce the sites to be rehabilitated when they are ready, but anticipated that some of those points would be located in the Brooklyn Army Terminal, the Annex Building in Sunset Park, Bathgate Industrial Park, in The Bronx and La Marqueta in East Harlem .
“These will all be public sites, City-owned sites and we will send you details on exact times and locations as they go online. And again, this is in addition to all the Health + Hospitals facilities, to the vaccination centers that we have already been installing, even in public school buildings and emerging sites of the Department of Health, “he warned.
De Blasio also asked the Cuomo Administration to give the Big Apple the approval to be able to vaccinate groups that are not yet in the plan of immunization currently.
“Health heroes deserve to be first. They were at the greatest risk. They surrendered, unfortunately, many of them gave their lives to be able to take care of patients, but now we want to go to people with the highest risk, who we know are older people, ”said the president, warning that many people on the line They have not wanted to vaccinate and they leave those doses free .
“Let us give our health heroes the freedom to vaccinate. So if someone is 98 years, let’s give them a vaccine . If someone is in one of the hospitals and is more than 75 years, they should automatically have the right to be vaccinated . We can do more than one thing at a time. We can focus on vaccinating all the heroes of health care who want the vaccine, “said the politician. “To all people in nursing homes and who work in nursing homes who want the vaccine, as we expand the categories, reaching people older than 75 years, reaching educators, reaching police officers, reaching all the people we need to receive the vaccine as quickly as possible. ”
The Mayor recalled that the City’s plan is to vaccinate 1 million people in January, but he warned that he needs federal help in order to carry out his plan, so he sent a letter to Vice President Mike Pence.
“We have a challenge, because right now in New York City, we don’t know when we are getting future shipments. We cannot plan. We need to do a million doses in the month of January. We still don’t know where those doses will come from. We need the federal government to fully use the Defense Production Law to maximize production, to give us the greatest possible clarity on the schedule so that we can plan, ”warned De Blasio.
The City further announced that this week they will begin vaccinating unaffiliated physicians such as dentists, physical therapists, home health aides and optometrists, who are estimated at about 50, 000 professionals.
De Blasio also referred to the authorities’ concern about the new strain of the coronavirus that was discovered in the United Kingdom, which has already arrived in New York, and took the opportunity to call on the federal government to issue a ban on the arrival of flights from that country.
“Now we have a new enemy, this new variant that was identified by pr The first time in the UK. We should all be concerned about this. Thank God, not because it is more deadly, but because it spreads, unfortunately, even faster ”, commented the Mayor . “We need the federal government to step in here and ban all travel from the UK to the US. And obviously I’m more specifically concerned with the three airports that serve New York City. It is time to leave the halftones. I mean, right now, you can still get on a plane in London, not even have proof that you have a negative test and happily come to New York City and spread the disease. Why? Why is that happening? “.
The mayor said that if a radical measure is not taken, it is putting the New Yorkers.
“If we don’t have a travel ban, then we are literally inviting this horrible new variant on the door even more and that doesn’t make sense (…) Let’s end that danger right now “, he added.
Governor Cuomo , for his part, assured that the new strain of coronavirus “could change the rules of the game,” which represents a greater threat.
After highlighting that the deaths of the last day reached 149 and warn that there was 12, 666 new infections, raising the average to 8. 31% Statewide , Cuomo appealed to those who have been exposed to the new strain to to contact the health authorities.
“This is a virus with which we must be very careful ( …) Even if the lethality does not increase, the fact that it is much more transmissible is a very real problem ”, commented the Democratic leader. “E this is a virus that travels. But we have to know. Containment is of vital importance here . It dramatically increases our challenge and we have to be aware of it. ”
COVID – 19 in figures
- 149 deaths were recorded throughout NY state last day
- 210 new hospitalizations were recorded on the last day
- 4, 07% is the rate of hospitalization
- 4,064 New daily infections in NY
- 9. 03 Average% of infections in the last 7 days in the city
- 8. 31% is the average number of infections in the state
- 8, 590 people are hospitalized
- 152,402 tests s and did on the last day in the state
- 12, 666 tested positive throughout the state