Suffolk’s positivity rate, hospitalizations remain high as hospitals brace for another holiday spike

Local hospitals and health officials are bracing for a post-Christmas surge even as they are coping with a surge that hit after the Thanksgiving holiday.

Peconic Bay Medical Center in Riverhead saw a spike in COVID-19 inpatient admissions in the past few days, with the number of COVID patients rising to 47, eight of them in ICU, PBMC president and CEO Andrew Mitchell said yesterday. The number of COVID-positive inpatients had been under 40 through the month of December and ranging between 10 in early November to 24 by the end of the month, according to data previously provided by the hospital.

Hospitals across Suffolk have seen COVID hospitalizations rise 179% since Thanksgiving Day, with new hospital admissions reaching a seven-day average of 60 per day — double the daily new admissions as of Thanksgiving Day.

COVID hospitalizations were already steadily rising in Suffolk before Thanksgiving, reflecting a surge in infection rates corresponding to colder weather settling in over the region in October. Still, new hospital admissions averaged only 14 per day in the month prior to Thanksgiving.

There’s been a nearly 10-fold increase in COVID fatalities in Suffolk over the same period, with deaths rising from a seven-day rolling average of 1 or less than 1 per day in the month before Thanksgiving, to a seven-day average of 9 per day as of Dec. 21. All told, 152 Suffolk residents have succumbed to the disease since Thanksgiving.

COVID-19 weekly stats forSuffolk County NY by RiverheadLOCAL on Scribd

Suffolk’s test positivity rate was 7.2% Monday and 7.2% on a seven-day average, according to data released yesterday by the state health department. The county’s 7-day positivity rate has increased 95% over what it was on Thanksgiving, from 3.7% to 7.2%.

Riverhead Town’s total confirmed cases (since March) grew to 1,530 on Dec. 21, an increase of 405 cases — 36% — since Thanksgiving. The state does not release testing data for individual towns so the positivity rate — which is the percentage of tests that were positive for COVID — is unavailable for towns.

Federal and state health officials urge people to avoid traditional Christmas gatherings, because holiday parties and dinners — even small ones — have been documented spreader events and are believed to be responsible for the surge in cases, hospitalizations and deaths since Thanksgiving.

Statewide, hospitalizations rose to 6,661 patients Monday, with 1,126 in ICU beds. There were 801 new admissions Monday.

The statewide positivity rate was 5.89%, with 9,716 positive results reported Monday.

The state reported 139 COVID fatalities Monday.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo yesterday announced that the Wadsworth Laboratory had begun “aggressive research” of the new strain of COVID-19 believed to be much more contagious — whose rapid prevalence in the United Kingdom prompted Prime Minister Boris Johnson to announce new lockdowns this weekend.

The governor said Wadsworth had already looked at more than 3,700 virus sequences identified in New York, but has yet to find the U.K. variant present in any of the samples. Six hospitals are working with the lab and the state health department to provide additional samples for genome research.

Cuomo said “there is a very real chance” the U.K. variant is already in New York.

He also announced that the three airlines that fly from the U.K. to New York have agreed to his request to test New York-bound travelers for the virus.