Washington, Nov 12(UNI) New York city Mayor Bill de Blasio announced on Wednesday the imposition of new set of restrictions across the city and warned that it was the city's "last chance" to stop a second wave of the coronavirus.
Under the new restrictions which come into effect from Friday bars, restaurants and gyms will have to close down by 22:00 hrs and people can only meet in groups of 10 or less.
Mayor Blasio further said that if the rate of spread of infection continued to rise, New York City's public school system will be shut down and children would begin online classes.
New York City was badly hit by the virus earlier this year when nearly 18,000 people died from COVID-19 in March, April and May, according to the city's Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
The rise in the number of cases in New York is in keeping with the countrywide trend as the United States has witnessed a surge in coronavirus with a record 61,964 Americans being hospitalised on Tuesday alone.
Health authorities said that on an average over 900 people a day are now dying with the disease across the country.
In November till now more than a million new cases have been reported which has pushed the total number of confirmed cases to over 10 million nationally with 239,732 deaths so far.
The US has witnessed more than 100,000 new cases per day over the last 10 days in what experts say may be a worse outbreak than those seen in the spring and summer and warn that hospitals across the country could be overwhelmed.
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