Governor Kathy brings the pandemic back to where it started based on speculation

NY Post 

Here we go again.

Gov. Kathy Hochul signed an executive order Friday to postpone elective hospital surgeries — something that hasn’t been done since the worst of the initial coronavirus outbreak last year.

Hochul said she made the move to deal with staffing shortages and boost bed capacity amid an anticipated “spike” in new cases and the emergence of the new Omicron variant in South Africa. The strain is named after a letter of the Greek alphabet.

“We’ve taken extraordinary action to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and combat this pandemic. However, we continue to see warning signs of spikes this upcoming winter, and while the new Omicron variant has yet to be detected in New York State, it’s coming,” Hochul said.

“In preparation, I am announcing urgent steps today to expand hospital capacity and help ensure our hospital systems can tackle any challenges posed by the pandemic as we head into the winter months. The vaccine remains one of our greatest weapons in fighting the pandemic, and I encourage every New Yorker to get vaccinated, and get the booster if you’re fully vaccinated.”

The edict curbing non-essential surgeries will kick in for hospitals with a limited capacity — defined as at or below 10 percent of available staffed bed capacity.

The new protocols will take effect on Friday, Dec. 3, and will be re-evaluated based on the latest COVID-19 data on Jan. 15.

Maybe Kath can ask Uncle Joe to send another battleship hospital to the Intrepid dock. Maybe we'll use it this time.

 

Eric Adams goes to the Hamptons and The Blaz goes to a concert in the Bronx as C.O.'s and nurses protest against horrible and dangerous working conditions at Rikers Island

PIX News 

  Correction officers protested outside Rikers Island on Monday over what they described as dangerous working conditions. 

AIR11 was over the scene around 2:45 p.m. as several hundred people gathered outside the jail complex holding signs.

A Correction Officers Benevolent Association spokesperson told PIX11 News the protest was not a walkout of on-duty guards. It was not immediately clear if inmates were left alone.

In a tweet on Monday, the Correction Officers Benevolent Association urged retired and off-duty city Department of Correction members and their families to join the protest.

“We’re calling on ALL retired and active, off-duty DOC Uniformed members and your families to meet COBA at the bridge on Monday, August 16th at 3PM. We’re joining forces with our union brothers and sisters from across NYC and we will make our voices heard!” the union tweeted.

The tweet also included a flyer that suggested members of the Correction Captains’ Association and Assistant Deputy Wardens Association would also join the protest.

“We need safer jails now. Enough is enough! City Hall has failed to protect us. Their reckless policies have put our lives in jeopardy,” the flyer read. 

COBA filed a lawsuit against the New York City Department of Correction in Queens Supreme Court last month, calling conditions for officers at D.O.C. facilities nothing short of a human rights emergency requiring immediate attention.

The complaints include back-breaking triple shifts of 24 hours or more, with few breaks or access to food and water, shortages of PPE to protect against COVID-19, and increased violence against officers and within the inmate population.

Veteran nurse Paulette McGee has spent 20 years working at Rikers in what she described as an environment of constant fear.

“We are now faced with urine being thrown at us, knives held to our neck,” McGee said. “I was assaulted in 2018: punched so hard in my jaw I was knocked out straight on my back.”

Joseph Russo, who’s with he Assistant Deputy Wardens Union, said inmates get away with things all the time. He said they’re not afraid to commit crimes and acts of violence behind bars.

“Our hands are tied. We cannot defend ourselves,” Russo said. “We’re here because of conditions on Rikers are outrageous; this is a chaotic gangland controlled area.”

 NY Post

Mayoral hopeful Eric Adams hit the Hamptons over the weekend, where his political talks — and outfit — impressed East End insiders.

The candidate attended a Water Mill fundraiser — wearing a bright red blazer that would’ve made The Weeknd jealous — on Sunday at a private home. The bash was hosted by a group including Democratic backer businessman Dennis Mehiel and Republican billionaire John Catsimatidis, as well as Victoria Schneps and Todd Shapiro. 

Two media owning oligarchs raising money for the news media's prematurely anointed predetermined mayor of NYC. This is some fucked up shit right here.

Nurses and funeral home directors are pissed about the bureaucratic bullshit affecting their jobs from the state and city

 

NY Post

 New York State nurses and other hospital workers are being exposed to “dangerous working conditions” amid the coronavirus pandemic because of “critical shortages” of personal protective gear, and they want “urgent action” from Gov. Andrew Cuomo to provide them with the equipment they need.

 That’s the message in a blistering April 11 letter sent by the New York State Nurses Association’s director to Howard Zucker, the state health commissioner, obtained by The Post.

The letter contradicts comments made by Melissa de Rosa, secretary to Gov. Cuomo, at a press briefing last week, in which she said that hospitals were receiving stockpiled PPE equipment and that no health care facilities in the state would have to resort to “crisis conservation.”

That means the reusing of masks, hospital gowns and other equipment meant to guard against the spread of COVID-19.

“At this point most hospitals and nursing homes in the New York City metropolitan area, which is the national epicenter of the pandemic, continue to operate under ‘crisis conservation’ standards because they do not have enough PPE to distribute to our desperate staff,” wrote Patricia Kane, the executive director of the Nurses Association, the union which represents 42,000 frontline nurses in the state.

NY Post

Frazzled funeral home directors are complaining about the invasion of the municipal body snatchers.
At least two Queens funeral directors say the city’s red tape is making their grim backlog of bodies even worse, as remains are sent to Randall’s Island for storage with little or no notice — and retrieving them has become nearly impossible.

Omar Rodriguez was scheduled to pick up two bodies last week from Elmhurst Hospital, only to find out the night before they’d been packed into two mobile morgues and taken to Randall’s Island.
But once there, workers on the island told him the bodies needed to go back to the hospital before they could be released, he said.

“I spoke to everybody and their mothers about how to get the bodies but no one had an answer,” he told The Post. “I was going back-and-forth. I told them I’m here, release the bodies to me. Eight hours later they were released on Randall’s Island.”