NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) – The extremely contagious Omicron variant is constant to unfold in New York state.
The present COVID positivity charge throughout the state is 22.5%. In New York Metropolis, it’s 21.4%. Within the northern suburbs, which the state refers to because the mid-Hudson areas, it’s 24.4%. On Lengthy Island, the positivity charge is among the many highest within the state, at 27.3%.
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As CBS2’s Jenna DeAngelis reviews, the halls of St. Anthony’s Excessive Faculty have been quiet Tuesday, with college students studying remotely the previous two days. That’s a call the principal of the South Huntington faculty made late December.
“The explanation we did that was two-fold. One, to evaluate staffing. May we open safely with our numbers? And two, households, many couldn’t get examined,” mentioned St. Anthony’s Excessive Faculty Principal Brother David Anthony Migliorino.
COVID VACCINE
College students return Wednesday, they usually’re ready for any workers shortages.
“We now have known as in all of our subs to come back daily no matter if we’d like them or not,” Migliorino mentioned.
Hicksville faculties handed out at-home exams in a drive-thru Tuesday. The district is briefly distant together with Freeport, Westbury and Glen Cove faculties, noting workers impacts from COVID.
As circumstances soar, Lengthy Island continues to have the very best positivity charge within the state.
“We’re at present experiencing the guts of this present Omicron surge,” mentioned David Hirschwerk of North Shore College Hospital.
Hirschwerk, the hospital’s medical director, says they check all sufferers for COVID. About 200 admitted are constructive. For now, the hospital is holding off on scheduling new surgical procedures that may wait a couple of weeks.
CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC
“We intend to do roughly 50-70% of what we’d usually do when it comes to surgical procedure. Nevertheless it’s a really cautious, selective look,” he mentioned.
Mount Sinai South Nassau says it’s rescheduling most elective surgical procedures that require an in a single day keep as about one-third of its mattress have COVID sufferers. Almost 200 workers are out sick, or in quarantine. In a press release, the hospital mentioned:
Mount Sinai South Nassau is rescheduling most elective surgical procedures that require an inpatient in a single day keep within the hospital as COVID-19 circumstances proceed to surge.
Out-patient ambulatory surgical procedures and procedures that don’t require an in a single day keep are continuing as scheduled as are chemotherapy infusions for most cancers sufferers.
All surgical circumstances are being fastidiously reviewed by the hospital’s surgical management to make sure that sufferers needing procedures are scheduled in a well timed method and to substantiate that solely circumstances that may safely be delayed are postponed.
The variety of COVID constructive sufferers has surged in current days with 100 COVID constructive in-patients at present hospitalized as of this morning. This represents roughly one-third of all obtainable beds at Mount Sinai South Nassau. On the similar time, almost 200 workers are out sick, both in quarantine or for surveillance as a consequence of COVID.
We’re fastidiously monitoring our affected person and staffing necessities and we stay hopeful that the current COVID surge as a result of omicron variant will peak within the coming weeks after which start to ease the variety of new COVID circumstances we’re seeing at our Emergency Division and in different areas of the hospital. Sufferers with questions on their procedures ought to contact their physicians on to acquire details about rescheduling. We admire everybody’s endurance and assist throughout yet one more difficult time.
First responders urge folks to keep away from going to emergency rooms to get examined and proceed to make use of EMS providers for emergencies solely.
“Individuals can check themselves at house as a substitute of overwhelming these well being care amenities, which has been actually the most important downside, versus hospitalizations,” mentioned Nassau County Chief Fireplace Marshall/County Fireplace Coordinator Michael Uttaro. “When the ambulances used to go on a run for one hour with the volunteers, they’d be away from house or away from their jobs for an hour. Now, that’s as much as two hours and in some circumstances three hours that they’re ready to switch their affected person to a mattress in an ER.”
Nassau County Govt Bruce Blakeman says extra assets are coming.
“We’re within the technique of buying extra check kits. We’re within the technique of establishing vaccination pods,” Blakeman mentioned. “We’re engaged on many fronts, however we’re very assured that that is manageable and we will likely be in fine condition in Nassau County.”
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A number of Lengthy Island libraries together with Sayville, Brentwood and Freeport are additionally briefly closed. They’re every citing both security causes or workers shortages as a consequence of COVID-19.
