Miami .- The increase in the country in the number of deaths and infections of the COVID-19 has led this Friday to New York and Illinois to follow in the footsteps of California and focus on confinement to mitigate the coronavirus, so as far as From this weekend about 70 million people will have to stay at home in what could be the prelude to a national quarantine.
California’s highways, among the busiest on the planet, dawned lightly crowded and offered a very distant picture of any given morning, following Governor Gavin Newsom’s order given last night for Californians to stay home and only basic businesses run. , in addition to hospitals.
On the East Coast, the governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo, ordered this day the closure of all non-essential businesses and asked the population to stay in their homes as much as possible to avoid infections, at a time when this state It is approaching 8,000 cases and the pandemic leaves 35 dead.
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As in California, the new restrictions, which take effect on Sunday night and affect 19 million people, exclude supermarkets, pharmacies, transport, clinics, gas stations and banks, in addition to the public transport network, although its use has been restricted.
After California and New York, the Governor of Illinois, Jay Robert Pritzker, announced this Friday the same measure, effective from Saturday and affecting more than 12 million people.
Thus, starting this weekend, at least 70 million people will have to stay home, including residents of the three most populous metropolitan areas in the country: Los Angeles, New York and Chicago.
The measures released today are given when the country has already surpassed the 200 death toll from COVID-19, and registers at least 15,964 cases, according to official information given by the authorities of the country’s states and territories.
Washington state continues to have the highest number of COVID-19 fatalities, with 74, followed by New York, with 35. The state with the most reported cases is New York with 7,102, while Washington state has 1,376 and California another 1,057 positives.
In the state of New York, of the total infected some 1,250, or 18%, are hospitalized, a percentage that threatens to overflow the hospitals in a short time, and to avoid it the authorities are working against the clock to enable more places, converting other buildings and trying to acquire the necessary equipment.
“Respirators (which help patients breathe) are in this war what missiles were in World War II,” Governor Cuomo said dramatically of the tools, including face masks, that are expected to be vital when cases continue to increase, as estimated.
In preparation for the likely shortage of medical supplies and hospital beds, the Government is preparing military hospitals for civilian use, and thousands of members of the National Guard are being deployed in various states.
“We are about to enter a new way of life here in Los Angeles,” said the mayor of this Californian city, Eric Garcetti, on Thursday night, who indicated that it will depend on what is done and how it is done that “determines how long it lasts this crisis. “
