Putnam Coronavirus: Seeking A Testing Site In The County

April 3 — Cases of new coronavirus have almost tripled in 10 days in Putnam County, according to the latest data Friday morning.

Of the 256 cases now confirmed in the county, 51 are in the town of Southeast, county officials said. Most of the residents infected are between 30 and 60 years old. There were four deaths in the past 24 hours.

Putnam officials have asked the state health department to open a test site in the county, because when the health department run out of test kits (they are sent out by the state in small batches) residents are forced to go out of the county to be tested for the new coronavirus.

The struggle to find test kits is not just Putnam's, County Executive MaryEllen Odell told Patch. "There’s a very common struggle every day with test kits, PPes, N95 masks, it’s been the same conversation over and over and over again."

Putnam Hospital is not conducting COVID-19 testing.

"We are urging residents to contact their primary care doctors," said spokeswoman Marcela Rojas. "After they receive a physician’s order, they call and make an appointment at one of four specimen collection sites Nuvance Health has set up, including in Connecticut at Danbury Hospital and Norwalk Hospital and in New York at Dutchess Stadium in Fishkill and Tech City in Kingston. At the sites, a trained healthcare provider uses a swab to collect a sample from a person’s nose. Those specimens are sent to a lab for testing. It can take up to six days to receive the results that will be relayed to the person through their doctor."

Not only is there a time lag, the data coming back to Putnam health officials from out-of-county isn't always complete, Odell said. That means it takes more time to identify the person and then begin the contact tracing and let people know they've been exposed.

"We quickly began to realize we needed our own testing site," she said. "Now with the numbers rising, Dutchess has a site, there's a site at Bear Mountain, we’re saying we need our own site."

Odell asked state Sen. Peter Harckham to plead the county's case in Albany.

"I have discussed this situation with the County Executive and have forwarded her concerns to the Administration," Harckham told Patch. "I know they are prioritizing denser population centers, but given its proximity to New York City and Westchester, Putnam needs to be next in the question for a testing location."

Putnam's numbers bring it within one case of Albany, on the list as the ninth-hardest-hit municipality, as of Friday morning. Albany and Putnam each have almost 100,000 residents.

New York's cases topped 100,000 overnight.

Odell said she thought New York — as the nation's number one target for terrorists — should have been better prepared, not with test kits but certainly with protective equipment for first responders and healthcare workers.

SOUTHEAST, NY — Hospital and county officials are working together to enhance the daily coronavirus dashboard with local data about the epidemic, said Putnam County Executive MaryEllen Odell.

“Our daily dashboard already includes the number of positive COVID-19 tests in Putnam, by town, gender and age of those affected,” Odell said. “Now that Putnam Hospital is sharing its information with the county, we will also be able to include hospital admissions and more. We want the public to have as complete a picture as possible of the local impact of the coronavirus epidemic.”

Peter Kelly, president of Putnam Hospital, urged residents to stay home, stay safe and help flatten the curve to ease the burden on the health care system.

“We hope that by sharing hospital data with the Putnam County Health Department on a daily basis, we will show the community how important it is to follow these urgent guidelines,” Kelly said. “This is for everyone’s benefit.”

More ventilators were sent to Westchester, Nassau and Suffolk counties overnight from New York state's stockpile, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said at his Thursday coronavirus news briefing. If the rate of deployment continues, the state has enough ventilators to hand out for about six more days, he said.

New York reported 92,381 confirmed cases of the new coronavirus on Thursday.

As the state scrambles for alternatives to the ventilators, staffers at Northwell Health came up with a way using a 3-D printer to modify BiPAP machines to help COVID-19 patients who are having trouble breathing. They are sharing the innovative adaptation with other hospitals across the state, Cuomo said.

BiPAP machines are commonly used to maintain a consistent breathing pattern in people with sleep apnea, congestive heart failure or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, a chronic inflammatory lung disease, said officials at Northwell, which has hospitals, urgent care centers and affiliated doctors across Westchester as well as Long Island and New York City.

Cuomo said the state has already taken a number of other extraordinary measures to acquire more ventilators and build its stockpile, including tracking where all the ventilators are located in New York and shifting their locations to meet the highest need and ending elective surgeries. If necessary, hospitals may also use anesthesia machine ventilators or use a "splitting" protocol where one ventilator is used for two patients using separate tubes.

Cuomo also announced the State has begun conducting a hospital-by-hospital survey on a nightly basis to take inventory of every hospital's supplies. Additionally, all hospitals are being asked to contribute the supplies they don't currently need to a central stockpile to be distributed to hospitals with the greatest need.

The number of confirmed new coronavirus cases in Long Island is catching up with the number of cases in Westchester, where the state's first hot spot was located. Both regions lag far behind New York City.

The increase is "troubling," Cuomo said.

LOCAL UPDATES

Southeast's E-Waste drop off scheduled for Saturday is cancelled. The next drop-off date is tentatively scheduled for May 2, depending on the virus situation.

Brewster's Village Board has extended the refuse bill deadline out two weeks so those who still need to pay their refuse bills can do so without penalty until April 15. The Board is also extending the budget billing period so if you would like to join the budget billing schedule for refuse, you may do so until April 15th. You will be required to pay for January, February, and March at that time, which will be $75 per unit. ($25 per month per unit for 3 months) and the April refuse bill will be mailed out on or about April 15th. If you would like to join, call the office Monday through Friday, 8:30 am to 4 pm, 845-279-3760 or email mchiudina@brewstervillage-ny.gov with your account number and/or Village address.