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New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Monday that state gyms, which have been closed for about five months, may resume indoor activities with new precautions as early as next week.
Cuomo said gyms would be allowed to resume operations at 33% capacity as of August 24. He added that gyms need to comply with state health requirements, which will be released later today. Guests and staff will be required to wear masks inside facilities, and gymnasiums will face new ventilation requirements.
While gyms will be subject to a host of new restrictions, the reopening is another step toward normalcy in New York City, which has successfully kept Covid-19 levels low statewide while continuing to gradually reopen parts of the economy. The state, which was one of the first in the United States to be affected by the coronavirus and to have suffered one of the deadliest epidemics to date, is charting the way forward.
“Gyms can open from August 24,” he said Monday at a press briefing. “The guidelines are released today on gyms. Basically the capacity is 33%. There are sanitary requirements that are in the guidelines that must be kept to their ventilation requirements. This is a whole new topic on which we can do a lot of. good work. “
Shares of Planet Fitness were up around 2% in intraday trading at the news.
“We look forward to working with our franchisees to safely reopen our New York locations in accordance with Governor Cuomo’s guidelines, to provide New Yorkers with much needed access to high quality and affordable health and fitness,” the company said in a statement to CNBC.
Cuomo added that local officials must inspect gyms before they reopen or within two weeks of opening “to ensure they meet all requirements.” He said localities have until September 2 to inspect gymnasiums and determine if they can reopen if they can’t do so by August 24.
“The state will, frankly, be making the tough decisions. I will say businesses need to close. I will say gyms need to close. I will say bars need to close. Let them blame me,” Cuomo said. “You local governments have to do the job of compliance and enforcement.”
He acknowledged that gym owners would likely criticize the state’s sanitary requirements as being too tough, but added that the guidelines were developed by health officials and engineers. He said the gyms are a “matter of concern” and “that’s why we took it slow.”
“If it’s not done well it can be a problem and we’ve seen it,” he said of reopening the gyms. “You have to get the economy going, you have to move life forward. It’s the constant tension that you try to walk and so far we’ve done well.”
Another reason the state is willing to allow gyms to reopen, Cuomo said, is for everyone to log into them, which allows for effective contact tracing if there is a cluster of infections dating back to a gym. He added that the state’s low overall infection rate means residents can do more activities safely without risking a massive outbreak.
Cuomo said 0.7% of all coronavirus tests in New York came back positive on Sunday, the most recent data available, adding that the state had on average less than 1% positive tests since June. He added that six people died from Covid-19 on Sunday, well below the more than 800 daily deaths the state saw at the height of the epidemic in April.
New York, once the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in the United States, has made strides in countering the initial outbreak and keeping the daily infection rate low compared to many other states. Still, the virus has infected more than 425,500 people and killed at least 32,800 people in the state, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
Cuomo has repeatedly warned in recent weeks that even if the numbers remain low, New Yorkers need to remain vigilant as the virus could rebound quickly if people, businesses and officials rush to reopen.
The entire state is now in the fourth and final phase of Cuomo’s plan to reopen, but a number of businesses, including gyms and restaurants, remain closed for domestic operations. Cuomo announced last week that bowling alleys could reopen with changes from Monday and that museums and other cultural sites would be allowed to reopen on August 24.
Cuomo has expressed particular caution about reopening gyms.
“We know the gyms are very problematic from other states. They opened them up and they had to shut them down,” Cuomo said at a press briefing Aug. 6. “We are here, laid delicately on this island in New York State, this sea has spread all around us, so we know we have this storm and we have to be very, very careful.”
Health officials are still learning how exactly the coronavirus is spread and what type of environment poses the greatest risk of infection. Infectious disease specialists say the outdoor environments in which people can disperse are the least risky. Overcrowded indoor environments with poor ventilation are among the most at-risk environments, experts say, adding that it is essential for people to wear masks in such conditions.
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