Governor Kathy Hochul announced on Tuesday that New York would end COVID-19 contact tracing efforts amid early signs that the wave of highly contagious omicron variants is reaching its peak.
New Yorkers who test positive for COVID-19 or who have had close exposures to the coronavirus will be asked to self-report their isolation and quarantine through a state-run website.
The website, which will launch on Wednesday, will provide people with isolation-related documents required by many employers and other settings, state officials said.
The move comes as the total daily number of COVID-19 cases statewide recently declined, falling to 48,686 on Monday from around 54,800 the previous day and well below the recent peak of 90,100 on Saturday.
“We’re not at the end, but I want to say…it’s a silver lining,” Hochul said at a news conference in Manhattan, referring to daily case numbers.
But the most drastic outbreak declines are happening in New York, which was first and hardest hit by the omicron variant in early December. The downward trend in cases is expected to be delayed by up to two weeks for many upstate counties, Hochul added.
In a sign of the omicron’s continued threat to upstate communities, Hochul announced that all hospitals in the Finger Lakes, Mohawk Valley and central New York regions would halt elective care to free up beds in due to understaffing and COVID-19 patient burden.
“We are still looking at a situation that we are approaching very seriously,” Hochul said, adding that tensions are heightened for hospitals serving communities with comparatively lower COVID-19 vaccination rates.
Statewide, hospitalizations for COVID-19 have continued to rise recently, reaching 12,540 on Monday. But hospitalizations are weeks behind cases, state officials said, adding that new data suggests that up to 42% of hospitalizations were for patients admitted to hospitals for unrelated health conditions. to COVID.
Health officials are reportedly considering resuming elective care at hospitals in those upstate areas in two weeks. There is also a list of 40 hospitals statewide that have suspended elective care because they are operating at less than 10% of their bed capacity.
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Why NY is ending COVID contact tracing
The decision to end COVID-19 contact tracing in New York, in part, conceded the massive scope of cases of omicron variants – which are found to be less severe than previous strains such as the delta variant – have made ineffective contact tracing surveys.
Health Commissioner Dr Mary Bassett said the omicron variant also has a very short incubation period and many other people are being tested.
“So the result is a very large number of people testing positive and a very short window to disrupt the chain of transmission,” she said, adding that public health workers currently involved in contact tracing would be redirected to focus on COVID-19 testing and vaccination efforts.
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Some counties, including Rockland and Putnam in the Hudson Valley, had previously asked people to alert others to possible exposure and set up a system that allows people to generate their own isolation letters for the work, school or public assistance. County leaders had said staff were too overwhelmed by the spike in COVID cases to keep up.
Hochul noted Tuesday that county officials would still be allowed to continue local contact tracing efforts, if they so choose, despite the state moving its efforts online. It was not immediately clear on Tuesday whether New Yorkers could call a state-run telephone hotline to obtain isolation documents.
Nancy Cutler of The Journal News/lohud contributed to this report.
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David Robinson is the state health care reporter for USA TODAY Network New York. He can be reached atdrobinson@gannett.com and followed on Twitter:@DrobinsonLoHud
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