NEW YORK (1010 WINS) – Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Friday that another 15 cases of the U.K. coronavirus variant have been identified in New York state.
The additional cases bring the statewide total to 59 cases since the first case was reported in Saratoga Springs in early January.
New York City has the highest number of variant cases at 18. In the metro area, there are another eight cases in Nassau, six in Suffolk, four in Westchester and one in Ulster.
“We’re watching it closely,” Cuomo said of the variant at his Friday briefing. “It’s all throughout the state, and it’s something that we are watching.”
Cuomo said the state's COVID positivity rate continues to decline after a post-holiday surge—it was 4.67% on Thursday, the lowest since Nov. 28—but he warned that coronavirus variants could pose a "new threat."
“All those numbers are on the way down, but what could change it? A variant strain could change it,” the governor said. “A variant strain that is more infectious, more transmittable or more lethal, or a variant strain that is resistant to the vaccine. Those could all be gamechangers.”
The U.K. variant may be up to 70% more transmissible than the original strain, but health officials have said they believe the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines offer protection against it.
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