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WPCNR WHITE PLAINS COMMON COUNCIL EXAMINER By John F. Bailey. September 24, 2022:

Verizon may begin installation of the company 5G wireless expansion in White Plains at will.

The city administration allowed the 60 day moratorium on implementation of the city-created upgraded regulations for monitoring new wireless installation of transmitters on locations throughout the city to expire this week.

The city did so without taking up new calls for stricter bans on locations near residences and monitorings of radiation levels by 5G Westchester, a advocacy group, WPCNR has learned.

There has been no official announcement of this by the city or by Verizon when the citywide 5G installations will start.

It is not known yet whether the anti 5G Wireless group demanding tighter protections for city residents will initiate legal action to halt the law from going into effect.

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WPCNR CORONAVIRUS SURVEILLANCE. Latest Covid Activity Figures from New York State Covid Tracker. Observation & Analysis by John F. Bailey. September 20, 2022UPDATED 2:15 P.M. E.D.T.:

New Covid cases August 28 through September 18 totaled 3,740 compared to the same period last year.

 It should be noted the three weeks of September last year surge in cases of 3,546 set the momentum for steadily increasing infections in October and November creating 3,076 new cases of covid in October, 3,757 in November, which lead to 41,000 infections the month of December and 36,000 in January. The spread was finally contained by the end of April after vaccinations began in January of 2022.

However when statewide mandates on covid preventive behaviors were lifted in June, infections steadily rose through June and the end of July, then began a 6 week consecutive decline in infections until last week.

The pattern may repeat itself. The main hope is that covid hospitalizations are down and the disease is lasting about a week for people who get it. But the disease does lay them low. The arrival of the new booster shots now available at the Westchester County Board of Health it is hoped the boosters should help those ready for the booster to fight off the omicron and delta variants which infect more quickly (as short as 48 hours after exposure).

This reduced period for symptoms to begin in persons exposed to covid, may be the reason behind the first significant increase in new covid cases in 6 weeks.

For the week ended Saturday, Sept. 11 to 17, the New York Covid Tracker reported 1,468 new Lab confirmed persons testing positive, compared to 1,026 September 4 to 11, a 43% increase in new cases.

No covid daily case updates were published by the state on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday last week. The Governor’s Press Office did not respond to my questions as to why the covid daily count was paused. This covid tracker report has to be continued, with no interruptions, in my opinion, otherwise there will be no ongoing record of the containment or lack of containment of the disease going forward.

After 10 days of school in the county the state school covid tracker has not started reporting yet. This was crucial to see if school spreading of disease, (entirely possible because there are no requirements for students to be vaccinated with covid). The other reason to expect a spread is as I have written previously school districts are lifting many restrictions: no masking, no social distancing, no plastic screens between desks in the classrooms.

Now in a little noticed change, there will be no covid state school report cards breaking down infections of students, administrators, teachers and staff for every school in the state.

UPDATED: IN AN AUGUST 22 LETTER FROM THE NEW YORK STATE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH ANNOUNCED THAT SCHOOLS WILL NOT BE REQUIRED TO REPORT DAILY POSITIVE COVID RESULTS TO THE NEW YORK STATE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH COVID SCHOOL REPORT CARD. SO GOING FORWARD THIS YEAR THE INFORMATION ON THE STATE OF COVID INFECTIONS WILL BE STRICTLY UP TO THE SCHOOL DISTRICTS NOW OPERATING AN A VERY OPEN ATMOSPHERE WITH RELIANCE ON HOME ALLEGEN TESTS. THIS IS THE FIRST TIME IT HAS COME TO LIGHT THAT SCHOOL REPORT CARDS ON COVID WOULD NOT BE AVAILABLE TO PARENTS THIS YEAR.

White Plains School Superintendent Dr. Joseph Ricca told WPCNR this afternoon that White Plains school nurses would continue to report cases of covid in their schools to the Westchester County Department of Health. Dr. Ricca said that in the first 10 days of School in White Plains, they have seen some cases of covid, but not near the levels of covid in the previous covid years. Ricca said it was up to the Westchester County Department to make public that data.

Asked if the school district would report White Plains schools covid cases regularly to parents as a standard report on a regular basis as district policy, Dr. Ricca said the district did not plan to do so at this time.

I asked him at what level would covid situations would be reported. Ricca said the district would be looking for “clusters” of infections in classrooms or schools or other situations and parents would be informed. He said there would not be detailed reports of how many students, administrators and teachers were sickened by covid on a school by school basis.

Last year in White Plains, unprecedented cooperation by parents children, teachers, administrators held infections of school populations to 25% (1,974).  This reporting of new cases that gave confidence the covid plague was being contained from spreading exponentially was a great confidence builder.

With basically open schools now across the county, with an atmosphere of “we just have to live with covid” will be, the disease may come back.

September is starting in infections at the same pace as last September.  Perhaps this is just temporary.

I hope so.

The state has to keep reporting those new school infections. I hope they will. So the pattern that started the climb to the huge covid cases in December and January 9 months ago could be repeating itself.

Cases around Westchester County the last two weeks are up. Currently 9 areas continue to have over 100 cases.

White Plains had  208 active cases the last 2 weeks, experiencing 50 new cases a day.  New Rochelle reported 223, 43 new cases daily.  Yonkers, long the place where the most covid infects are went to 635 active cases up from 576 a week ago—the number of new cases a day in Yonkers was 187.

Mount Vernon reported 202 cases, 59 new cases a day.

Greenburgh next door to White Plains reported  194 active cases, running  57 cases a day.

The northern part of Westchester is suffering similar outbreaks.

Cortlandt reported 135 active cases the last two weeks, 25 daily.

Yorktown hit 167 active cases with 32 new each day.

North Castle and New Castle combined  had 95 active cases,   21 a day

Ossining Village, 120, 18 a day; Peekskill reported 73 with  12 daily and Port Chester 73/ 12 a day.

The average new cases per day for the 9 communities with over 100 active cases is 53 new cases of covid a day.

Cross your fingers.

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Governor Kathy Hochul today updated New Yorkers on the state’s progress combating COVID-19.    

Last week, Governor Hochul announced the availability of bivalent COVID-19 vaccine boosters from Pfizer-BioNTech for anyone age 12 or older and from Moderna for those 18 or older. To schedule an appointment for a booster, New Yorkers should contact their local pharmacy, county health department, or healthcare provider; visit vaccines.gov; text their ZIP code to 438829, or call 1-800-232-0233 to find nearby locations.   

Today’s data is summarized briefly below:   

• Cases Per 100k – 22.41 
• 7-Day Average Cases Per 100k – 20.42  
• Test Results Reported – 59,068  
• Total Positive – 4,380  
• Percent Positive – 7.47%**   
• 7-Day Average Percent Positive – 6.72%**      
• Patient Hospitalization – 2,063 (-77) 
• Patients Newly Admitted – 338 
• Patients in ICU – 217 (-5)  
• Patients in ICU with Intubation – 81 (-2) 
• Total Discharges – 341,702 (391) 
• New deaths reported by healthcare facilities through HERDS – 15  
• Total deaths reported by healthcare facilities through HERDS – 57,906 

** Due to the test reporting policy change by the federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and several other factors, the most reliable metric to measure virus impact on a community is the case per 100,000 data — not percent positivity.      

The Health Electronic Response Data System is a NYS DOH data source that collects confirmed daily death data as reported by hospitals, nursing homes and adult care facilities only.     

Important Note: Effective Monday, April 4, the federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is no longer requiring testing facilities that use COVID-19 rapid antigen tests to report negative results. As a result, New York State’s percent positive metric will be computed using only lab-reported PCR results. Positive antigen tests will still be reported to New York State and reporting of new daily cases and cases per 100k will continue to include both PCR and antigen tests. Due to this change and other factors, including changes in testing practices, the most reliable metric to measure virus impact on a community is the case per 100,000 data — not percent positivity.    

• Total deaths reported to and compiled by the CDC – 73,978  

This daily COVID-19 provisional death certificate data reported by NYS DOH and NYC to the CDC includes those who died in any location, including hospitals, nursing homes, adult care facilities, at home, in hospice and other settings.      

• Total vaccine doses administered – 40,164,502         
• Total vaccine doses administered over past 24 hours – 5,686
• Total vaccine doses administered over past 7 days – 31,682
• Percent of New Yorkers ages 18 and older with at least one vaccine dose – 93.3%
• Percent of New Yorkers ages 18 and older with completed vaccine series – 84.7%
• Percent of New Yorkers ages 18 and older with at least one vaccine dose (CDC) – 95.0%
• Percent of New Yorkers ages 18 and older with completed vaccine series (CDC) – 88.5%
• Percent of New Yorkers ages 12-17 with at least one vaccine dose (CDC) – 85.5%
• Percent of New Yorkers ages 12-17 with completed vaccine series (CDC) – 75.0%
• Percent of all New Yorkers with at least one vaccine dose – 83.4%
• Percent of all New Yorkers with completed vaccine series – 75.4%
• Percent of all New Yorkers with at least one vaccine dose (CDC) – 92.2%
• Percent of all New Yorkers with completed vaccine series (CDC) – 78.6%

Each region’s 7-day average of cases per 100K population is as follows:      

REGION	Tuesday, September 13, 2022	Wednesday, September 14, 2022	Thursday, September 15, 2022
Capital Region	17.74	19.15	19.03
Central New York	21.94	23.14	23.45
Finger Lakes	13.41	14.57	14.42
Long Island	24.37	24.19	24.26
Mid-Hudson	18.33	20.13	20.93
Mohawk Valley	22.73	23.20	22.61
New York City	19.89	19.80	19.69
North Country	20.66	21.82	22.71
Southern Tier	20.49	21.10	20.87
Western New York	18.17	18.53	19.03
Statewide	19.90	20.33	20.42

Each region’s 7-day average percentage of positive test results reported over the last three days is as follows**:      

Region	Tuesday, September 13, 2022	Wednesday, September 14, 2022	Thursday, September 15, 2022
Capital Region	9.04%	9.29%	9.54%
Central New York	9.85%	10.20%	10.50%
Finger Lakes	7.38%	7.38%	7.47%
Long Island	7.63%	7.72%	7.75%
Mid-Hudson	6.62%	5.93%	6.14%
Mohawk Valley	12.08%	11.56%	11.46%
New York City	5.34%	5.15%	5.22%
North Country	9.89%	10.03%	10.62%
Southern Tier	9.06%	8.70%	8.67%
Western New York	12.36%	12.17%	12.67%
Statewide	6.79%	6.60%	6.72%

** Due to the test reporting policy change by the federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and several other factors, the most reliable metric to measure virus impact on a community is the case per 100,000 data — not percent positivity.      

Each New York City borough’s 7-day average percentage of positive test results reported over the last three days is as follows **:      

Borough in NYC	Tuesday, September 13, 2022	Wednesday, September 14, 2022	Thursday, September 15, 2022
Bronx	5.67%	5.58%	5.75%
Kings	4.47%	4.20%	4.29%
New York	5.07%	4.97%	5.08%
Queens	6.66%	6.52%	6.47%
Richmond	5.84%	5.56%	5.57%

** Due to the test reporting policy change by the federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and several other factors, the most reliable metric to measure virus impact on a community is the case per 100,000 data — not percent positivity.      

Yesterday, 4,380 New Yorkers tested positive for COVID-19 in New York State, bringing the total to 5,981,280. A geographic breakdown is as follows:      

County	Total Positive	New Positive
Albany	72,059	60
Allegany	10,052	10
Broome	53,617	57
Cattaraugus	17,900	20
Cayuga	18,714	25
Chautauqua	27,327	33
Chemung	24,491	20
Chenango	10,865	12
Clinton	20,377	25
Columbia	12,415	13
Cortland	12,291	7
Delaware	9,283	9
Dutchess	76,308	98
Erie	249,505	260
Essex	6,940	9
Franklin	11,097	12
Fulton	15,039	22
Genesee	15,370	11
Greene	10,003	9
Hamilton	1,002	1
Herkimer	16,155	8
Jefferson	24,141	41
Lewis	6,852	4
Livingston	13,300	10
Madison	15,466	10
Monroe	177,507	116
Montgomery	13,788	21
Nassau	492,492	312
Niagara	55,606	31
NYC	2,783,789	1,747
Oneida	63,518	42
Onondaga	131,946	132
Ontario	23,723	17
Orange	125,362	110
Orleans	9,769	9
Oswego	31,421	51
Otsego	12,170	5
Putnam	28,375	34
Rensselaer	38,284	31
Rockland	107,876	56
Saratoga	56,413	55
Schenectady	40,078	31
Schoharie	5,991	4
Schuyler	4,032	2
Seneca	6,936	15
St. Lawrence	24,476	25
Steuben	23,281	20
Suffolk	508,614	342
Sullivan	21,999	20
Tioga	12,827	13
Tompkins	24,348	24
Ulster	38,611	53
Warren	16,978	20
Washington	14,355	13
Wayne	20,057	15
Westchester	302,716	214
Wyoming	9,332	8
Yates	4,041	6

Below is data that shows how many hospitalized individuals who have tested positive for COVID-19 were admitted for COVID-19/COVID-19 complications and how many were admitted for non-COVID-19 conditions:   

Region	COVID-19 Patients currently hospitalized	Admitted due to COVID or complications of COVID	% Admitted due to COVID or complications of COVID	Admitted where COVID was not included as one of the reasons for admission	% Admitted where COVID was not included as one of the reasons for admission
Capital Region	116	70	60.3%	46	39.7%
Central New York	77	45	58.4%	32	41.6%
Finger Lakes	198	74	37.4%	124	62.6%
Long Island	352	147	41.8%	205	58.2%
Mid-Hudson	230	77	33.5%	153	66.5%
Mohawk Valley	51	32	62.7%	19	37.3%
New York City	769	317	41.2%	452	58.8%
North Country	54	36	66.7%	18	33.3%
Southern Tier	98	48	49.0%	50	51.0%
Western New York	118	45	38.1%	73	61.9%
Statewide	2,063	891	43.2%	1,172	56.8%

The Omicron variant now represents more than 95% of the viruses in circulation. For more information on variant tracking, please visit here: (COVID-19 Variant Data | Department of Health (ny.gov).     

Yesterday, there were 15 total new deaths were reported due to COVID-19, bringing the total to 57,906. A geographic breakdown is as follows, by county of residence:  

County	New Deaths
Allegany	1
Broome	1
Erie	1
Genesee	2
Greene	1
Kings	1
Monroe	1
Nassau	1
Oswego	1
Queens	4
Ulster	1
Grand Total	15

New Yorkers looking to schedule vaccine appointments for 5-11-year-old children are encouraged to contact their child’s pediatrician, family physician, county health departments, Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs), rural health centers, or pharmacies that may be administering the vaccine for this age group. Parents and guardians can visit vaccines.gov, text their ZIP code to 438829, or call 1-800-232-0233 to find nearby locations. Make sure that the provider offers the Pfizer-BioNTechCOVID-19 vaccine, as the other COVID-19 vaccines are not yet authorized for this age group.      

Visit our website for parents and guardians for new information, frequently asked questions and answers, and resources specifically designed for parents and guardians of this age group.      

A geographic breakdown of New Yorkers who have been vaccinated and boosted by region is as follows:  

Regional Vaccination Data by Provider Location
	People with at least one vaccine dose	People with complete vaccine series
Region	Cumulative Total	Cumulative Total
Capital Region	983,389	900,234
Central New York	658,869	609,542
Finger Lakes	886,407	820,364
Long Island	2,245,137	1,999,834
Mid-Hudson	1,761,818	1,544,798
Mohawk Valley	331,644	308,863
New York City	8,272,058	7,320,528
North Country	311,721	281,875
Southern Tier	454,546	414,507
Western New York	978,584	899,203
Statewide	16,884,173	15,099,748
Booster/Additional Shots
Region	Cumulative Total	Increase over past 7  days
Capital Region	598,993	401
Central New York	401,659	310
Finger Lakes	629,270	404
Long Island	1,433,771	1,027
Mid-Hudson	1,132,476	406
Mohawk Valley	209,547	114
New York City	3,721,123	4,195
North Country	188,449	65
Southern Tier	285,495	128
Western New York	666,973	481
Statewide	9,267,756	7,531

The COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker Dashboard is available to update New Yorkers on the distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine. The New York State Department of Health requires vaccinating facilities to report all COVID-19 vaccine administration data within 24 hours; the vaccine administration data on the dashboard is updated daily to reflect the most up-to-date metrics in the state’s vaccination effort. New York State Department of Health-reported data from NYSIIS and CIR differs slightly from federally reported data, which is inclusive of federally administered doses and other minor differences. Both numbers are included in the release above.