Governor Cuomo Announces British Airways and Delta Airlines Agree to Test All Passengers Before Entering New York State, and COVID-19 Indicators DECEMBER 21, 2020

 

Asks Virgin Atlantic to Join British Airways and Delta Airlines in Voluntarily Testing Passengers Before Boarding Flights to New York

6,331 Patient Hospitalizations Statewide 

1,095 Patients in the ICU; 613 Intubated 

Statewide Positivity Rate is 5.75%

109 COVID-19 Deaths in New York State Yesterday

 Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today announced that in the wake of a new, highly contagious variant of the COVID-19 virus found in the United Kingdom, British Airways and Delta Airlines have voluntarily agreed to require a COVID-19 test before allowing passengers to board planes traveling from the United Kingdom to New York. With this move, New York joins the list of 120 countries with a similar requirement on flights from the U.K. The Governor has asked Virgin Atlantic, the other airline that runs flights from the U.K. to New York, to do the same. The Governor is also continuing to call on the federal government to impose enhanced travel restrictions, as 120 other countries have done, to avoid the same grave mistakes of the spring where the virus entered New York from Europe with no warning.

"When you do not require flights from the U.K to be tested, you are allowing thousands of U.K. passengers to arrive here every day and based on New York's experience in the spring, I believe this new, highly contagious strain of COVID-19 is already here," Governor Cuomo said. "This is another disaster waiting to happen and all efforts must be placed into averting another crisis. Now, it's on the federal government to do its job, correct the wrongs of the past and take swift action to impose enhanced travel restrictions just as 120 other countries have done." 

Today's data is summarized briefly below:

• Test Results Reported - 156,510
• Tested Positive - 9,007
• Percent Positive - 5.75%
• Patient Hospitalization - 6,331 (+146)
• Patients Newly Admitted - 700
• Hospital Counties - 55
• Number ICU - 1,095 (+50)
• Number ICU with Intubation - 613 (+13)
• Total Discharges - 95,779 (+472)
• Deaths - 109
• Total Deaths - 28,709