Coronavirus News: New York now leads every country in COVID-19 cases
NEW YORK (WABC) -- New York state now leads every country (outside of the United States) in the world in coronavirus with 159,937 confirmed COVID-19 cases.
That's a jump of more than 10,000 new cases in a single day.
New York surpassed Spain, which has 152,446 confirmed cases.
The state also reported a record number of deaths for a third consecutive day with 799, raising the outbreak total above 7,000.
Cuomo described the virus as a "silent explosion that ripples through society with the same randomness, the same evil that we saw on 9/11."
Despite the worsening toll, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said, New York City's hospitals have so far stood up under the enormous strain. In fact, the increase in hospitalizations is down from the unsustainable pace of last week, as are intensive care admissions.
More than 18,000 patients were hospitalized in the state.
"Today we can say that we have lost many of our brothers and sisters, but we haven't lost anyone because they couldn't get the right and best health care that they could," Cuomo said.
The rising daily deaths in the past few days reflect people hospitalized earlier in the outbreak.
Overall, the state is finally showing progress in slowing transmission, the governor said at a state Capitol news briefing.
"We're flattening the curve so far," he said. Cuomo has been navigating the cross-currents of hopeful and horrible news in recent days. Deaths are spiking, yet new hospitalizations are slowing. Light is at the end of the tunnel, but New Yorkers absolutely must not end their weeks of isolation just yet, he said.
"It is good news. 'Well, now I can relax,' No, you can't relax," he cautioned. "The flattening of the curve last night happened because of what we did yesterday and the day before and the day before that."
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