#40 NYC ZIP codes above 4 percent as COVID-19 comeback fears grow

City Hall revealed late Friday that COVID-19 test positivity rates have ticked above 4 percent in 40 ZIP codes across the Big Apple as officials fear a second wave of the dreaded pandemic is building in the run-up to the Thanksgiving holiday.

The hardest-hit ZIP code is out in the Rockaways, Breezy Point’s 11697, which posted the highest positivity rate in the five boroughs. Over the last seven days, 9.6 percent of tests from residents in the area have come back positive.

Another Queens ZIP — Ozone Park’s 11416 — posted the second-highest seven-day rate, 7 percent; while Staten Island’s Tottenville followed closely behind, at 6.3 percent.

All told, 40 of the city’s 177 ZIP codes have average positivity rates that now exceed 4 percent.

“It is now clear that we have entered community spread in New York City,” wrote Press Secretary Bill Neidhardt, in a sobering tweet. “While we’ve seen clusters, they are not the sole nexus of COVID.”

Mayor Bill de Blasio warned Friday morning that the city’s surging caseload and rising positivity rates could mean that Gov. Andrew Cuomo imposes “orange zone” coronavirus restrictions on the Big Apple by the first week of December.

Those rules would suspend indoor dining, again shutter gyms and hair salons and would impose a new four-person per table limit on outdoor dining.

“I’ve been very overt about the fact that the governor has said an orange zone is coming to New York City,” Hizzoner told WNYC’s Brian Lehrer. “By our projections based on the state data, Brian, that will happen soon after Thanksgiving, probably the first week of December.”

Cuomo danced around the timeline when asked by reporters during a conference call he held Friday, before concluding that it would depend on the Thanksgiving holiday and saying “nobody knows.”

Overall, state officials reported the 2.9 percent of the record 205,000 coronavirus test results received yesterday were positive, up from 2.7 percent the day before.

In New York City, 3 percent of the tests taken over the last seven days came back positive as the five boroughs saw another 1255 new cases of the coronavirus reported.

Additional reporting by Bernadette Hogan