New York close to flattening the curve as mayor reveals ‘striking’ decrease in coronavirus admissions

Bill de Blasio said there was a ‘striking’ difference between the projected and real numbers needing ventilators this week

New York City Mayor de Blasio said there was still more work to do, to manage the coronavirus (AFP via Getty Images)

New York’s mayor Bill de Blasio has said that the current number of coronavirus patients placed on ventilators is fewer than the city had projected.

During a coronavirus briefing on Tuesday, the Mayor said the numbers for ICU patients needing ventilators “might even be going down”.

City authorities had expected up to 300 more people per day to need the lifesaving treatment at this stage of the pandemic.

In a statement, the mayor said: “We thought we’d need many more ventilators to come in this week just to get through the week.”

According to Mr de Blasio, the actual number is an increase of 100 people a day, or fewer, going on ventilators.

It is believed to be the first time that the mayor has said there was a sufficient supply of ventilators to meet demand for this week, in part due to the unexpected decrease in demand.

“We’ve seen much fewer needed than expected,” said Mr de Blasio. “But to be clear, we still need more.”

At present, there are 5,500 ventilators across New York City hospitals and 135 in an emergency reserve, which is up from the 3,500 ventilators the city had at the begriming of the pandemic.

On Monday, a ProPublica investigation discovered that New York authorities had auctioned off ventilators and medical supplies that had been stockpiled to prepare for a future pandemic, but that the state health department could not afford to maintain them.

Mayor de Blasio thanked state and federal authorities who had responded to New York’s request for ventilators, with 500 more handed to the city from the New York state stockpile on Tuesday. He described the apparent stabilisation of ICU hospital admissions and ventilator use was “striking”.

In comments made to CNN’s John Berman, the mayor said the “rate of increase in [the] number of people who came into a hospital and needed a ventilator, it’s really reduced now”.

It comes 24 hours after the number of coronavirus deaths in the city surpassed the 3,500 mark — more than the number of people killed during the 9/11 terror attacks in 2001.

The mayor cautioned that the statistics did not include hundreds of people who had possibly died at home from the coronavirus.

In an interview with Fox news, he said: “We should not underestimate for a second this horrible phenomenon of people dying at home.”

Mr de Blasio later added that New York was “nowhere near” reopening but that social distancing measures appeared to be having a “real impact”.