New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo officially declared Tuesday that gun violence is a state epidemic analogous to the novel coronavirus.
Mr. Cuomo made public his disaster emergency order during a speech at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in Manhattan, calling it the first-of-its-kind in the nation.
According to a report in the New York Daily News, the emergency declaration lets the state “quickly allocate money and other resources” to places in the state with rampant gun violence.
The New York Democrat’s speech repeated drew parallels to the COVID-19 pandemic, though he has been vigorously criticized from many sides for his handling of that epidemic, most notably over his order that nursing homes could not “discriminate” against people with the virus, which put infected people among exactly the most vulnerable population.
“If you can beat COVID, you can beat gun violence,” the governor said, calling gun violence a public-health emergency. “We’re in a new epidemic, and it’s gun violence, and it’s a matter of life and death also.”
