NEW YORK (1010 WINS) -- Mayor Bill de Blasio on Thursday announced a number of measures to help New Yorkers combat the coronavirus — including giving out hundreds of thousands of free face coverings — as the city reported 277 new deaths and 2,347 new positive cases.
New York City on Thursday reported a total of 12,571 confirmed COVID-19 deaths and 5,295 probable deaths, bringing the combined death toll to 17,866 — up from 17,589 on Wednesday.
As of Wednesday evening, 162,212 people in New York City had tested positive for COVID-19, including 36,969 in the Bronx, 42,996 in Brooklyn, 20,121 in Manhattan, 50,304 in Queens and 11,752 on Staten Island, according to data released Thursday. Seventy of the total cases were listed as "unknown."
LISTEN LIVE: 1010 WINS' 24/7 coverage of the coronavirus outbreak
During his daily briefing, de Blasio said the city will hand out hundreds of thousands of face coverings to residents for free in the coming weeks. The face coverings will be distributed in city parks, starting with some of the most popular parks.
De Blasio said 100,000 face coverings will be given out this week "and we'll keep going from there."
People interested in free face coverings can find out where to get them by viewing a map at nyc.gov/facecoverings.
City workers are also being assigned to patrol parks and public spaces to make sure social distancing measures are being followed, the mayor said.
He said the over 1,000 full-time staff from agencies like the Parks Department and FDNY will "complement" NYPD patrols and the response to 311 reports.
The workers will also distribute 275,000 face coverings for free across the city starting this week.
De Blasio also said Citi Bike is expanding in the Bronx and Upper Manhattan. The expansion includes over 100 new stations, including those serving essential workers at Lincoln Hospital and Harlem Hospital.
When it comes to health care workers, De Blasio also announced that the city has been securing millions of gowns.
The mayor said 1 million gowns have arrived in the US from a factory in Vietnam and are in transit to New York City. Another 900,000 gowns are being loaded in Vietnam onto planes bound for New York City.
De Blasio said the city has purchased 3 million more gowns that are now in production. He said the city will be sufficiently supplied with gowns at a "crisis standard" until mid-May.
"A month ago none were being produced at all," he said.
The mayor also announced that three more NYCHA testing sites are now open. They are at the Jonathan Williams Houses in Williamsburg, the Woodside Houses in Woodside and the St. Nicholas Houses in Harlem.
He said two more H+H community testing sites are opening this weekend at the Ida G Israel Clinic in Coney Island and the Dyckman-Clinica de Las Americas in Inwood.
There are now 11 H+H community testing sites, de Blasio said, and there will be 30 H+H community testing sites by the week of May 18.
The mayor said New York City is tripling testing capacity at these community sites. He said 14,000 tests were already being performed this week. He said 35,000 tests will be performed per week by the week of May 4 and 43,000 tests will be performed per week by the week of May 18.
"This is the first of many steps we are going to take. This is the precursor to the bigger testing and tracing operation that will go throughout May," de Blasio said.
De Blasio also said the city is seeing "progress" with key indicators tracking the spread of the coronavirus.
He said people admitted to hospitals for suspected COVID-19 was down to 129 from 136.
People currently in the ICU at public hospitals with suspected COVID-19 dropped from 734 to 705, the mayor said.
And the percentage of people tested citywide who were positive for COVID-19 dropped from 23 percent to 22 percent.
The only indicator that was moving in the wrong direction was the percentage of people tested at public health labs who were positive for COVID-19; that number rose from 29 percent to 36 percent.
Like 1010 WINS on Facebook and follow @1010WINS on Twitter to get breaking news, traffic, and weather for New York City.
