NEW YORK _ Top city elected officials called on Mayor de Blasio to implement a lockdown in New York along the lines of ones in France and Spain.
"We are in a state of emergency and we must move quickly to mitigate the impact of coronavirus/COVID-19 on our city," Council Speaker Corey Johnson said in a Sunday statement. "All nonessential services must be closed, including bars and restaurants. We should keep essentials like grocery stores, bodegas, pharmacies, and banks open.
"And restaurants that can make deliveries should be able to stay open to provide delivery service for New Yorkers," he added.
The statement came shortly after de Blasio reiterated his reluctance to shut down schools, let alone bars and restaurants.
"Look at Italy ... I feel for everyone there, they've gone to full shutdown," Hizzoner said in a pre-taped interview that aired Sunday morning on WABC-TV. "God forbid that ever happened here, because they have lost not just the year 2020, but they've lost 2021 and maybe 2022 in terms of creating a functioning society."
"If we slip into much more of a shutdown, people have to understand all of the consequences of that and how long it will take to bring it back," the mayor added.
Earlier this month, Italy, one of the hardest-hit countries in the world, began a national lockdown restricting internal movement until at least April 3. Schools, stadiums and other sites there have all closed, along with bars and restaurants and most stores. France and Spain have followed suit.
Comptroller Scott Stringer joined the call for a Big Apple lockdown.
"Logic says we need universal testing but that's sadly not happening," Stringer tweeted Sunday. "Strategy says we need more aggressive social distancing. That is why today, out of an abundance of caution, I am calling for a city shutdown."
Councilman Steve Levin (D-Brooklyn) fears the city has as little as a week to implement a shutdown _ which would limit human contact _ before the virus spread beyond the capacity of the health care system.
"This is all actually a call to stability," he told the Daily News. "We dealt with 9/11, we dealt with Sandy ... We can do something like this, but we need to be told that it's gotta happen."
New York City had 269 confirmed cases as of Saturday night. There were 613 cases statewide.
