Governor Andrew Cuomo says the state is taking steps to prepare for possible cases of Ebola in New York.
Cuomo and a number of high-level state officials held a news briefing Thursday to outline the measures currently being taken. That includes the establishment of eight hospitals across the state that are undergoing intensive training to respond to a diagnosed case. The nearest to Western New York is the University of Rochester Medical Center.
The governor says the entire system, from mass transit hubs to hospitals, is being coordinated. He says the state will be running unannounced practical drills at colleges and mass transit centers.
"Ebola is frightening, there is no doubt about that. It is a very serious disease," Cuomo said. "It is a situation where how government performs actually matters."
Cuomo says there is no reason for state residents to panic. He says the state is learning from mistakes made in Dallas, where three people have been diagnosed with the deadly disease, a now-deceased man who traveled from Liberia and two nurses who treated him.
"We've been operating under the assumption that at some point, we would have to deal with an Ebola case. Why? Because our operating model is, better safe than sorry, err on the side of caution," said Cuomo, who compared the preparedness effort to those of the state's destructive storms of recent years.
Ebola has killed thousands of people in the West African nations of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea. The governor says he wouldn't be surprised if an Ebola case was diagnosed in New York, given the state's high volume of travelers, both domestic and international.
