NOVEMBER 2020 • LONGISLANDPRESS.COM 35
COVID-19 ROUNDUP
LATEST PANDEMIC HEADLINES
TRI-STATE TRAVEL
DISCOURAGED
The governors of New York State, New
Jersey, and Connecticut issued a travel
advisory on Oct. 20 discouraging residents
from visiting neighboring states
to avoid the spread of the coronavirus.
Citing economic concerns, New York
State Gov. Andrew Cuomo, New Jersey
Gov. Phil Murphy, and Connecticut Gov.
Ned Lamont stopped short of requiring
anyone who needs to cross tri-state
borders to self-quarantine for 14 days.
“We’re urging all of our residents to
avoid unnecessary or nonessential
travel between states at this time, but
will not subject residents of our states to a
quarantine if coming from a neighboring
state,” Cuomo, Murphy, and Lamont said
in a joint statement. “The travel advisory
was designed to keep our respective
states safe, with the understanding that
we are a connected region, dependent on
each other when it comes to commerce,
education, and health care.”
The travel advisory comes as New Jersey
and Connecticut have seen a spike
in cases. Cuomo also declined to quarantine
travelers from Pennsylvania,
which has also seen an uptick, for the
same reason as the tri-state area.
New York State requires travelers from
38 states, plus Puerto Rico and Guam, to
self-quarantine for two weeks to curb
the spread of COVID-19.
-Timothy Bolger
NY TOPS HALF A MILLION CASES
New York, the former epicenter of the
U.S. COVID-19 pandemic, became on
Oct. 25 the fourth U.S. state to surpass
half a million coronavirus cases amid a
nationwide surge in infections.
New York State is reporting 80 percent
more cases in the past four weeks as
compared to the previous four weeks,
according to a Reuters analysis. The
state reported more than 2,000 new
daily cases twice in recent days, a daily
increase not seen since May.
It is far from the state’s record of 12,847
new cases on April 10 — a period when
A health worker takes a swab sample from a man to test for COVID-19 in New York on Sept. 25, 2020. (REUTERS/Brendan McDermid)
refrigerated trucks stored bodies outside
hospitals and the U.S. Navy hospital
ship Comfort sailed past the Statue of
Liberty.
California has the most reported cases
in the nation at more than 900,000, followed
by Texas and Florida. However,
on a per capita basis, North Dakota,
South Dakota, and Louisiana have the
most cases.
New York has reported more than
33,000 deaths, the most in the country
and the second highest on a per capita
basis after New Jersey.
-Reuters
FIVE TOWNS HOTSPOT
DECLINES
Progress has been made in tamping
down a spike in coronavirus cases in
the Five Towns area, Nassau County
officials said Oct. 20 while opening a
new drive-through COVID-19 rapid test
site in the community.
The infection rate in Lawrence and
Inwood has dropped from up to seven
times to four times higher than the
countywide average of about 1 percent,
although there has been a slight uptick
in cases in Woodmere, officials said.
“This is a little bit of a troubling spot,”
Nassau County Executive Laura Curran
told reporters while announcing the debut
of the new test site at the Five Towns
Community Center in a partnership
with Mount Sinai South Nassau hospital
in Oceanside.
Parts of the Five Towns have been
included in the New York State Cluster
Action Initiative aimed at containing
COVID-19 hot spots in Brooklyn,
Rockland, and Orange counties, which
face the strictest rules and have been
marked as red zones by health officials.
-TB
SWEET 16 DUBBED
SUPERSPREADER
Suffolk County officials fined the Miller
Place Inn for allegedly violating social distancing
orders meant to curb the spread of
coronavirus after 37 people who attended
an over-capacity sweet 16 party there
were diagnosed with COVID-19.
County Department of Health Services
investigators found that the 37 cases
were among 81 people who attended the
party at the venue on Sept. 25 despite
the fact that gatherings are limited to
50 due to the pandemic, officials said.
“This was a superspreader event,” Suffolk
County Executive Steve Bellone
told reporters on Oct. 13 during a news
conference. “This cluster should serve
as a stark reminder of the potential
consequences of violating COVID-19
codes.”
Suffolk fined the catering hall $10,000
for allegedly violating Gov. Andrew
Cuomo’s executive orders prohibiting
gatherings of larger than 50 people or 50
percent of a venue’s capacity, whichever
is less. It also fined the venue $2,000 for
violating the county’s sanitary code.
-TB
LI-MADE VACCINE ADVANCES
The Serum Institute of India has begun
manufacturing a coronavirus vaccine
it developed in partnership with
Farmingdale-based Codagenix, Inc., a
clinical-stage biotechnology company.
The vaccine, which uses live COVID-19,
known as live-attenuated vaccine, is
called CDX-005. Now that preclinical
animal studies have been completed,
Codagenix expects to initiate a Phase
1 first in-human clinical trial in the
United Kingdom by the end of this year.
“Today marks an important step in our
efforts to advance the development of
CDX-005,” Codagenix CEO J. Robert
Coleman, Ph.D, said.
-TB
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