Indoor dining will be closed in New York City beginning Monday, due to the steady climbing in hospitalizations of coronavirus victims, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced Friday.
As of Friday (Dec. 11), “Total COVID hospitalizations are at 5,321. Of the 212,672 tests reported yesterday, 10,595 were positive (4.98% of total). Sadly, there were 87 fatalities,” Cuomo said.
Indoor dining will close in New York City starting Monday.
Hospitalizations have not stabilized, and with a rising infection rate and NYC’s density, this means that indoor dining is too high of a risk.
Takeout, delivery and outdoor dining will continue.
— Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo)
“The hospitalizations continue to increase in New York City,” Cuomo said. “We said that we would watch it. If the hospitalizations didn’t stabilize, we would close indoor dining. It has not. We’re going to close indoor dining on Monday.”
Cuomo also warned that the borough of Staten Island is being particularly hard hit: 25 percent of the COVID-19 deaths in the city in the first week of December were in Staten Island, he said during his daily coronavirus briefing.
In Albany holding a COVID briefing. Watch live: https://t.co/hYWbkI4gSD
— Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo)
The Pfizer coronavirus vaccine was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration on Friday; 170,000 doses of the vaccine are expected to be delivered to New York State this weekend, Cuomo said. He added that 346,000 doses of the Moderna coronavirus vaccine are expected to be delivered to the state during the week of December 21.