COVID-19 numbers here grow--and it's just starting

4/1/2020

By Patsy Nicosia

COVID-19 isn’t a we vs. them or an upstate vs. downstate issue, Schoharie County Public Health Director Amy Gildemeister told supervisors Monday.
It’s hitting us all.
In a conference call update, from the COVID-19 Task Force, Dr. Gildemeister said the number of positive cases here has reached six; additionally, the Health Department is monitoring 40-45 more.
The number of confirmed cases would be substantially higher if more tests were available, Dr. Gildemeister said, but they remain in critically short supply and are being used to clear health care workers or for the very ill.
“There is more disease in the community than we know and have recorded,” she said, and as the virus becomes more routine, the Health Department will stop issuing press releases for each new case.
A statement on the Schoharie County website outlines COVID do’s and don’ts.
Under the don’ts:
Don’t travel here from a place experiencing higher outbreaks of the virus and don’t expect there will be more resources—health care, tests, or food—available locally.
Some supervisors have shared that message in their own towns and Monday, Summit Supervisor Harold Vroman asked about those concerns.
Some states—including Vermont—Supervisors’ Chairman Bill Federice of Conesville said, are requiring people who move from one town to another to report to Public Health and then self-quarantine for 14 days.
But not only is that not enforceable, he said, in New York State “we can’t issue these kinds of orders. The state took that home rule right away from us.
“The Governor is on the record that he won’t prohibit people from moving in and out of the area.”
And the horse has already left the barn anyway.
Sixty percent of Conesville’s homeowners are seasonal or weekend residents, Mr. Federice said, “and I see a whole lot of cars in driveways that I don’t see this time of year.” At issue is limited local resources, “but that fact of the matter is, we can’t enforce it,” he said.
So far, Dr. Gildemeister said, none of the now six confirmed COVID-19 cases have been brought here by people fleeing New York City.
Some of the cases, she said, are in people who visited NYC before the pandemic; in others, the source is unknown.
“It’s tempting to look for someone to blame,” she said, “but there are a number of cases in Albany…a number of people going back and forth to New York City a few weeks ago,” while no local cases that can be linked to traffic going the other way.
For COVID-19, the best rules rules remain the same: practice social distancing and use hand sanitizer, Dr. Gildemeister said, noting deaths in the state crossed the 1,000 mark Sunday and are “still on an upward trajectory.”
Locally, we’re lagging behind New York City, where the apex is expected to hit mid-April.
“Ours will likely come after that,” she said and Governor Andrew Cuomo has pointed to that fact as one reason not to bar downstaters: Upstate hospitals won’t be able to handle the number of cases expected on their own, he said Saturday, and may need to move some patients to downstate facilities.
Friday, Governor Cuomo extended New York on Pause and school closings for two more weeks and Dr. Gildemeister said she fully expects the school closing to last through the end of April.
At the Governor’s request, she said, Cobleskill Community Hospital has increased its bed capacity by 50 percent and is working hard to get to 100 percent, but ventilators remain in very short supply, not only locally, but across the Northeast.
“The thought of sending people somewhere else [for medical treatment] may not be as reasonable as it usually is,” she said.