Another spin from our neighbor Deblasio - Con man Dr. Varma
Question: My next question is a COVID question and maybe Dr. Varma can weigh in as well. Are you baffled, surprised, can you explain the fact that there's been no measurable uptick from Phase One, Phase Two, Phase Three, given the massive increase in the number of cases in other states and a loosely enforced quarantine at best, do you think there's some kind of herd immunity taking root in New York City, New York State that explains the level of transmission at this point, and if Dr. Varma could weigh in as well?
Mayor: I'll start and turn to Dr. Varma very quickly. Andrew, it's a great question. I just remind you New Yorkers learned powerful lessons, and then they really owned those lessons in terms of wearing face coverings, in terms of social distancing. We have to look at how much discipline and focus there has been, how much unity there's been in New York City, which we did not see in the other parts of the country that have had the problems. A lot of precautions put in place. People have been really devoted, putting up those hand sanitizer stands, all sorts of things that have helped to keep people safe, and then the Test and Trace Corps, huge x-factor to have that constant presence out there working with people, making sure they're safe, making sure they have what they need, obviously massive testing. We're up to 40,000 tests a day now. That's something a lot of other places have not been able to achieve. I think all of these pieces are contributing to why you see sustained progress. Take it away, Dr. Varma.
Senior Advisor Jay Varma: Yeah. Thank you very much for the question. I concur entirely with actually the Mayor's assessment. I think it would be incorrect to attribute the current status of cases to immunity, because there's a lot that we don't know about immunity and there's also what we know, which is that the vast majority of New Yorkers actually weren't infected. So the most likely explanations for our current situation are as the Mayor pointed out the combination of our defensive strategies, physical distancing, wearing face covers, good hygiene, and as the Mayor also pointed out importantly, the offensive strategies, a massive increase in the amount of testing that's going on and testing that's tied to identifying contacts and safely separating cases and contacts.
Mayor: I don't, I may have missed it. You speak to the herd immunity question?
Senior Advisor Varma: Yes, Mr. Mayor. Yes, I mentioned, I think that immunity is a very unlikely explanation for this because we know that the vast majority of New Yorkers actually weren't infected, and so we're not nearly at a level where we would expect that immunity would play a major role in decreasing transmission. There's still far too many New Yorkers who are susceptible. Thank you doctor.
