The rate of the coronavirus’ spread through New York state is accelerating like a “bullet train,” Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Tuesday, as the number of confirmed cases eclipsed 25,000, with more than 200 dead.
“We’re not slowing it, and it is accelerating on its own,” said Cuomo in a press briefing at Manhattan’s Javits Center, currently being converted to a 2,000-bed hospital complex. “The [disease] forecaster said to me, ‘We were looking at a freight train coming across the country.
“We’re now looking at a bullet train.”
The disease’s spread is now doubling every three days in the Empire State, which as of Tuesday morning had 25,665 confirmed cases, with 210 now dead.
More than half those cases — 14,904 — are in the five boroughs, Cuomo said.
The rate has led experts to project an eventual peak demand of 140,000 hospital beds — up from the 110,000 that Cuomo had previously predicted.
The state has only about 53,000 permanent hospital beds.
The increased rate led Cuomo to project that the worst could hit in as little as two to three weeks.
“It accelerates the apex, to a point where it could be as close as 14 to 21 days,” he said. “The apex is higher than we thought, and the apex is sooner than we thought.
“The inescapable conclusion is the rate of infection is going up.”
