Governor Andrew Cuomo and his aides are still scrambling to create new hospital beds and procure adequate medical equipment. But the governor says he’s also assigning a team to try to figure out how and when to restart the economy in the coming weeks.
Cuomo says the effort, known as New York Forward, will look at whether, for instance, it’s safe to allow those who have already had the virus and recovered to go back to work.
The Democrat continues to say that he’d like to test more members of the public for the presence of COVID-19 antibodies to find out who has already had the virus without knowing it.
Cuomo says, “You can’t stop the economy forever.”
“You turned off the engine quickly,” Cuomo said. “How do you now restart?”
The governor says he has absolutely “no second thoughts” about ordering a complete shutdown of businesses this week, and imposing social distancing requirements everywhere else. But he says long term, it’s “unsustainable.”