N.Y.C. Death Toll Tops 1,500 as Cuomo Warns on Ventilators – The New York Times

The deans also made a more ambitious request: that the court consider letting graduates working under licensed lawyers seek admission to the bar without sitting for the bar examination.

Three weeks after the virus was first detected in New York Citys jails, including Rikers Island, four in 10 inmates were being held in quarantine as the number of cases continued to rise.

The latest quarantine figures were released late Wednesday by the citys Board of Correction, which monitors the citys jails.

Correction officials said separately that as of Thursday morning, 223 staff members, 231 inmates and 38 health care workers assigned to the jails had tested positive for the virus.

Inmates were now being screened for symptoms before being arraigned, board officials said.

Officials have moved to release about 900 detainees from the jails in the past two weeks to stem the viruss spread. But inmates and correction staff members have said that conditions at the jails were still unsanitary.

Inmates have found inventive ways to protect themselves, using diluted shampoo as a disinfectant and alcohol pads from a jail barber to sanitize phones.

Jail workers have complained about not having access to protective gear like masks and gloves, and about what they said was a failure to notify them when they had come into contact with a someone who had been infected.

Reporting was contributed by Kevin Armstrong, Jonah Engel Bromwich, Maria Cramer, Luis Ferr-Sadurn, Alan Feuer, Michael Gold, Corey Kilgannon, Adam Liptak, Jesse McKinley, Andy Newman, Jan Ransom, Brian M. Rosenthal, Andrea Salcedo, Michael Schwirtz, Eliza Shapiro, Matt Stevens, James Wagner and Michael Wilson.

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N.Y.C. Death Toll Tops 1,500 as Cuomo Warns on Ventilators - The New York Times