ALBANY (WCBS 880) — Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Wednesday announced New York will receive 170,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccines as soon as this weekend.
He said the state’s definitive plan is to vaccinate nursing home residents first, followed by nursing home staff and high-risk hospital workers.
The governor said that the state is managing three COVID operations concurrently with the first being hospital management.
“First we’re managing hospitals, under what we call our ‘Surge and Flex’ program. This is a hospital capacity crisis, more and more it’s becoming a greater crisis for hospitals as their capacity is starting to diminish,” Cuomo said.
He added that the hospitals are going to “have to be extraordinarily flexible” to handle the patient load that is expected in the upcoming weeks.
The second operation New York is conducting is slowing the spread of the virus, especially as the holidays remain upcoming and people are expected to break COVID guidelines. The state plans to release new factors to that plan on Friday.
“And third, we have the vaccine, which is the weapon that will win the war,” Cuomo said.
Cuomo said New York State has 90 regional centers that are ready to store the first shipment of the Pfizer vaccine.
The pharmaceutical company is anticipating its vaccine will be approved by the Federal Drug and Food Administration on Thursday. New York State’s vaccine panel is also set to approve it for residents this week.
Once the vaccine ships, the doses will be allocated by regions: 72,000 doses will go to New York City, 26,500 to Long Island, and 19,200 to the Mid-Hudson region.
The governor said he will be working on a public service announcement campaign to instill confidence in the vaccine. He told WAMC radio that convincing the public to take the vaccine will be a challenge.
“For the vaccine to work you have to hit 75 to 80% critical mass. You know have 50% of the people who says they won't take the vaccine. That is a mathematical conundrum,” he said.
Mayor de Blasio also spoke about the vaccine arriving in New York City on Wednesday, saying the city will post vaccine information as it comes available on nyc.gov/COVIDVaccine.
New York City Health Commissioner David Chokshi says the city is also expecting the Moderna vaccine to arrive as soon as Dec. 22.
And despite Cuomo’s concerns on hospitals, Mayor de Blasio insists New York City is handling the new wave very well. Though only 19% of hospital beds are currently available and three-quarters of ICU rooms are taken.
“Clearly the unpick is having an impact on them and we're working very closely with the state to make adjustments,” de Blasio said.
The mayor credits go Cuomo's plan to have hospitals work together to modify their loads.
Health Commissioner Dr. Chokshi says they are monitoring the numbers.
“We are concerned when we see particularly the cases go up because that does turn into hospitalizations go up as well and we are starting to see that in our indicators,” he said.
But Chokshi says the hospitals have been preparing for this for months, with surge plans relating to extra space for beds and ICU capacity.
The federal government has also reportedly allowed New York State to forego submitting personal information on those who receive the vaccine – something Gov. Cuomo said would be used by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to locate undocumented immigrants that receive the vaccine.
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