MAY 2020 • LONGISLANDPRESS.COM 13
THIS MONTH
AGAINST COVID-19 PANDEMIC
U.S. President Donald Trump and U.S. Vice President Mike Pence watch a video of New York governor Andrew Cuomo speaking at Cuomo's daily briefing,
during the daily coronavirus disease (COVID-19) task force briefing at the White House in Washington, U.S., April 19, 2020. REUTERS/Al Drago/File Photo
as LI hospitalizations hit a plateau and
began declining to more manageable
levels. The federal hospitals will remain
standing, unstaffed, for the likelihood
of a second wave of coronavirus later
this year, officials said.
TALK SHOW HOST
While the Cuomo show has drama galore
and more heartbreaking details
than can fit in a single newspaper, it
also has moments of levity.
There’s been the governor’s fatherly
advice to never object to a daughter’s
boyfriend, warning that daughters
will instinctively side with their boyfriends.
Quips about how tough-talking
New Yorkers will make sure strangers
abide by social-distancing and mask
rules in public. But few days drew as
many laughs as when the governor’s
younger brother CNN host Chris Cuomo
dialed into a couple of the April
briefings while the TV reporter was
quarantined in the basement of his
Southampton home after testing positive
for COVID-19.
“You look like you’ve been cutting your
own hair,” Chris joked, before sharing
details of a dream he had in which the
governor was wearing a ballet outfit
and dancing with a wand.
"Obviously the fever has affected your
mental capacity," the governor replied.
The banter is not uncommon to those
who regularly watch the younger
Cuomo’s show, on which the governor
regularly appears.
“I know that sometimes we joke,” the
governor said. “We're not going to
do that today. Rule one is never hit a
brother when he's down, and you're
literally in the basement.”
LOCKDOWN
While the governor has widely earned
high marks for his efforts, he is not without
his critics — and not just the president.
Health experts have questioned if Cuomo
waited too long to temporarily close
schools and businesses, allowing the
virus to spread “like fire through dry
grass,” as he likes to say, before issuing
the order on March 15, two weeks after
the first confirmed case in the state.
Studies have since showed that coronavirus
was believed to have spread among
thousands of New Yorkers in February,
with Stony Brook University Hospital
saying its first suspected case was Feb. 7,
a month before LI’s first confirmed case.
“You have to move really fast,” Dr. Thomas
R. Frieden, a former commissioner
of New York City’s Health Department,
told The New York Times. “Hours and
days. Not weeks. Once it gets a head of
steam, there is no way to stop it.”
Cuomo, who said recently that he
wished he or someone “blew the bugle”
sooner, later criticized the media for not
doing enough to alert the public.
“No state moved faster from the first
case to total closedown,” Cuomo said
when asked about the criticism, adding
his frequent refrain that it’s not wise
to Monday-morning quarterback while
the game is at halftime.
Of course, if another wave is coming
as predicted, The Cuomo Show will get
renewed for a second season as the coronavirus
war and the blame game head
into overtime.
“No state moved faster from the first case to total
closedown,” said Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
/LONGISLANDPRESS.COM
