BUFFALO, N.Y. — On May 15, five regions began reopening in New York State. The Western New York Region was not one of them because it failed to meet several of the state's required metrics. All of those involved hospitals.
The Western New York Region hit its lowest daily hospitalization number (202) on 5/8. Since that date, the numbers have climbed to 214, with one small dip to 208 on 5/12. The daily hospitalization rose again the next day to 214 again, and then dropped again on 5/14 to 204.
Because the region has not maintained a 14-day decline in net hospitalizations OR had fewer than 15 new hospitalizations per day, both calculated on a 3-day average, it fails to meet the first metric to begin the first phase of reopening.
The state does not release data for tracking the other two categories where the region is deficient, but the state's Regional Monitoring Dashboard says the Western New York Region has only had two days of declining hospital deaths and has averaged 9 hospital deaths over the last three days (the state requires 14 days of decline or fewer than 5 deaths).
While the hospital numbers have not been going down, the number of new cases is dropping.
A closer look at the number of new cases shows fluctuation in the number of new cases per day.
- 5/8 – 105
- 5/9 – 134
- 5/10 – 45
- 5/11 – 68
- 5/12 – 98
- 5/13 – 89
- 5/14 – 145
Those fluctuations are better understood by looking at the number of tests during the same time period.
- 5/8 – 1,491
- 5/9 – 1,689
- 5/10 – 727
- 5/11 – 1,001
- 5/12 – 2,175
- 5/13 – 2,306
- 5/14 – 2,576
As testing increased initially, more positives were found. But the percent positive in the Western New York Region is now declining sharply.
Here's a closer look at the recent percentages.
- 5/8 – 7%
- 5/9 – 8%
- 5/10 – 6%
- 5/11 – 7%
- 5/12 – 5%
- 5/13 – 4%
- 5/14 – 6%
So while hospitalization rates for the region are rising slightly, the percentage of new cases found is at its lowest point since testing was just beginning in March.
