NEW YORK (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 09th June, 2020) New York Governor Andrew Cuomo pleaded on Monday with the thousands of protesters filling New York City to protest against police brutality to get tested for the coronavirus, saying he feared another spike in infections in a city reopening after a 100-day shutdown over the pandemic.
"We had thousands of people show up for protests and did that affect the spread of the virus?" Cuomo asked at a news conference. "We don't know. So I'm asking the protesters: Please go get a test. It's free. It's available. There is a chance that you were in proximity to people."
Tens of thousands of Americans have taken to the streets across the United States over the past two weeks after George Floyd, an unarmed black man, in Minneapolis, Minnesota, was killed by a white police officer who pressed his knee to Floyd's neck for almost nine minutes while Floyd was handcuffed face down on the street.
Cuomo, who supports the Floyd-related protests in New York City with plans to enact police and criminal law reforms, said he was also concerned about another spike in COVID-19 cases among protesters who did not practice social-distancing.
"We've gone through this, what they call a super spreader," the governor said. "One person in a crowd of 100 people can infect dozens. We've seen it. We have 15 testing sites in the New York City area that are prioritized just for protesters. We're also focusing on the hotspot neighborhoods in New York. These are zip codes where we know there's a much higher infection rate than other parts of the city. Some of these communities are over 50 percent in their infection rate."
The United States has been the country worst hit by the coronavirus, with New York being the epicenter for the outbreak, accounting for about a quarter of the more than 2 million cases and 112,000 deaths in the country from the pandemic.
