Westchester Food Bank Need Up 200 percent

WESTCHESTER, NY — Food pantries in Westchester County report a 200 percent surge in demand, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said at his Monday briefing. The new coronavirus pandemic has driven up unemployment due to the business shutdown. Westchester is the hardest-hit in New York state.

He also announced new programs to address food insecurity, including the Nourish New York Initiative and a push to get philanthropies to get involved.

According to Feeding Westchester, the need has more than doubled since the outbreak began.

About half-a million people in Westchester County are now unsure about their next meals, Feeding Westchester officials said on Facebook.

Much of it has to do with the unemployment resulting from the government's order for businesses to shut down or have staff work from home.

The governor continued to lay out details about re-opening the economy. While, the set of orders called NY-PAUSE ends May 15, and regions upstate with low infection rates and declining hospitalizations may begin immediately reopening in phases, Cuomo said he expected to extend the PAUSE orders downstate.

The questions for each region as it opens include how will businesses change, how will the local health-care system cope, and are there systems in place for isolating new cases and tracing back all their contacts for testing and quarantine.

The outbreak is ongoing, he said, noting that the curve of new hospitalizations has flattened somewhat.

"We're still seeing 1,000 new patients every day," he said.

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