New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has warned that the peak of the coronavirus in the state might not be for another 45 days during a press briefing on Tuesday.

If his estimation is correct, it may take far longer to get back to normal than many people have been expecting.

“The expected peak is around 45 days,” Cuomo said. “That can be plus or minus, depending on what we do.”

A major problem in New York is the lack of hospital beds necessary to treat people who are infected. The Brooklyn Eagle reports that there are only 53,000 hospital beds in the state, including just 3,000 of the all-important Intensive Care Unit beds, of which 80 percent are currently occupied.

“That, my friends, is the problem,” Cuomo said. “This is an extraordinary time in this nation’s history… It will go down in the history books as one of those moments of true crisis and confusion and chaos.”

Cuomo also said that New York will need between 55,000 to 110,000 additional hospital beds to handle the outbreak, and 18,600 to 37,200 of them must be ICU beds.

When asked if he was considering a shelter-in-place order like what we have seen in some cities, Cuomo would not rule it out.

“The curve is not flattening to a level we can sustain. Which would suggest that we’re going to take even more efforts to flatten the curve. That’s what we’re exploring now. It is likely that we’re going to take more steps to slow the spread by reducing the density,” Cuomo responded.

As of 10:30 a.m. on March 17, there are 644 confirmed cases of the coronavirus in New York City.

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