New York reported 48,982 new COVID-19 cases in the week ending Sunday, up from 44,235 new cases the prior week. The worst infection rates hit parts of New York City and Long Island, with much of upstate New York seeing comparatively lower numbers of cases.

New York ranked 17th among the states where coronavirus was spreading the fastest on a per-person basis, a USA TODAY Network analysis of Johns Hopkins University data shows.

Nationally, COVID-19 cases decreased about 14% from the week before, with 781,487 cases reported. Across the country, 13 states had more cases in the latest week than they did in the week before.

Ellen Fraint holds her daughter, seven-month-old Jojo, as she receives the first dose of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine for children at Montefiore Medical Group in … Show more   

TED SHAFFREY, AP

In New York, 221 people were reported dead of COVID-19 in the week ending Sunday, up from 173 deaths the prior week.

“We’re sitting on this horrible plateau,” said Dr. Daniel Griffin, an infectious disease specialist with Pro Health Care in New York and a clinical instructor of medicine at Columbia University. “It’s been this way for the past couple of months, and we’re getting used to it.”

In July, more than 12,500 Americans died of COVID-19, according to the USA TODAY analysis.

Coronavirus deaths are similar to the number of influenza deaths normally reported during peak season, said David Dowdy, epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. A bad flu season in the USA could see more than 50,000 deaths. 

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That doesn’t mean COVID-19 mortality has reached that of flu, he said, as peak flu season lasts only about three months. Spread over the course of the year, Dowdy said, there would be about four times as many COVID-19 deaths than flu deaths.

COVID-19 is “like having to live in flu season year round, and that’s not what we do with the flu,” he said. “If we had to do that with the flu, we’d be instituting more measures than what we do.”

Despite the rise in COVID-19 cases and deaths in New York, a slight decline last week in hospitalizations offered some reprieve for the health system. Meanwhile, authorities braced for a potential resurgence in cases this fall and winter, as people spend more time indoors where the virus spreads more easily.

Gael Brown-Madrigal, 10, receives the first dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for children five to 12 years at NYC Health + Hospitals Harlem Hospital, … Show more   

JEENAH MOON, AP

Further, the virus currently to pose a comparatively higher threat in the New York City area, including parts of the Hudson Valley. A total of 10 counties, including those in New York City, Long Island as well as Westchester, Rockland and Putnam, remained in the high risk category due to COVID-19 infection rates and strain on local hospitals, according to federal guidelines.

State and federal health officials urged people to wear masks indoors in public spaces in all counties within the high-risk category, regardless of vaccination status, to help curb the virus' spread.

Meanwhile, authorities continued to struggle to improve COVID-19 vaccination and booster rates nationally, despite the lingering threat of serious illness and death posing a disproportionately higher risk among the unvaccinated and un-boosted population.

In New York, for example, only about 53,100 children ages six months through 4 years have received an initial dose of COVID-19 vaccine. That reflects about 5% of the age group, which was approved for shots in June. That rate lagged behind the pace of vaccination in older children and adults.