Cattaraugus County reported only five new cases of COVID-19 on Sunday, but the Western New York region was surging with a testing positivity rate of nearly 5% on Saturday.
Lt. Gov. Kathy Hochul said Sunday during an event in Buffalo that there is an ”unacceptably high” infection rate in the region, according to WGRZ. There has been concern that Gov. Andrew Cuomo could order some new restrictions in the region because of the infection rate, although the highest numbers are reflected in Erie County, with close to 500 new cases over the weekend.
The state’s strategy since the summer has been to focus on specific communities regarding COVID-19 spikes and placing any sort of increased restrictions, rather than focus on region-wide shutdowns.
In Cattaraugus County, the five new cases increased the county’s total to 540 since the beginning of the pandemic. Six new cases were reported Saturday as well. The county health department’s active positive COVID-19 caseload was 95 Sunday as there are 426 residents who have recovered and there have been 19 total deaths.
Of the five cases reported Sunday, three of the residents live in the northeast quadrant of the county — two males and one female — and none of the three reported any known contact with anyone who was positive for the virus.
The other two are a female living in the southeast part of the county, who had no known contact with anyone with COVID-19, and a female living in the northwest part of the county, who had direct contact with some positive for the virus.
Of the six new cases, four are residents of the southeast quadrant of the county, which has seen the most COVID-19 infection.
Two are male — one of them a healthcare worker who reported no known contact with someone positive for the virus, the other reporting direct contact. Two are female — one who reports no known contact with anyone positive for the virus, and the other who reported direct contact with someone with COVID-19.
Also among the new cases reported Saturday was a woman healthcare worker, from the southwest part of the county, who reported direct contact with someone with COVID-19, and a male resident of the northeast part of the county who also reported direct contact with someone with the virus.
New York confirmed another 3,428 cases of coronavirus on Sunday as 18 more people died from the virus, according to Cuomo’s office. Sunday’s update was based on 145,642 tests, with a positive testing rate of 2.35%.
On Saturday the state reported 3,587 new cases, the most since May, and another 18 deaths on Saturday. On Sunday, 1,396 people were hospitalized.
