New York state set to start reopening from May 15 in phases

New York state, the American hotspot of the Covid-19 pandemic, will start reopening around mid-May, starting with low-risk businesses in areas with a low incidence of the disease. New York City and its areas, which have carried the brunt of the epidemic, will remain under lockdown.

“The numbers are on the drop: everything we have done is working,” New York governor Andrew Cuomo told reporters. “There’s no doubt that we’ve gone at this point through the most harmful. And as long as we act prudently going forward, the most dangerous should be over.”

Phase 1 of the reopening could start on May 15, when the stay-at-home orders in the state are set to end. Cuomo told reporters Monday that he will be continuing these restrictions — called the “New York on Pause” order — for areas of the state and will “unpause” them for some but urged local officials, who are raring to reopen, to be “smart” about it, and think their options carefully.

Several US states have reopened or decided to over past few days as the spread has reduced with an ongoing decline in new cases and hospitalization — Colorado, Mississippi, Minnesota, Montana and Tennessee. In addition to South Carolina, Georgia, Alaska and Oklahoma. But the total number for all of the United States still looks daunting: total infections went up by 27, 631 to 965,951 over the last 24 hours and fatalities by 1,126 to 54,877.

New York state has been the worst hit with 288,045 infections thus far and 22,269 death with 17,280 in New York City alone. Low-incidence area of upstate New York could begin reopening after May 15 when New “York State On Pause” is set to end. The reopening of an area or region will depend on a steady drop in new cases for 14 days there, and will apply to construction and manufacturing sectors.,

These areas will be strictly observed and the state could move to the next phase only if there was no increase in cases because of the reopening. In phase two, the resumption would be “business-by-business”.