NY governor urges Trump to mandate mask use in public

By Beyza Binnur Donmez

ANKARA (AA) - New York Governor Andrew Cuomo on Monday urged President Donald Trump to sing an executive order mandating people to wear masks in public as coronavirus cases continue to surge.

"Let the president lead by example and let the president put a mask on it," Cuomo said in press briefing.

Trump said in late May he would not wear mask in front of cameras to not "give the press the pleasure of seeing it."

Taking a swipe to reopening economies, Cuomo said rushing reopenings "was not good" for the economy as it is favored by Trump.

"What has been happening is, when that virus spikes, the market goes down, not up," he underlined. "This was not a smart policy to rush reopening. It did not help the economy. It’s the exact opposite."

Daily coronavirus cases hit an all-time high of 40,000 on Thursday, according to the data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Recent spikes in cases and hospitalizations forced a dozen states, including Florida and Arizona to pause their reopenings or reimpose new restrictions to curb the spread of the virus.

The US is the worst-hit country by the pandemic with more than 2.5 million cases and nearly 126,000 fatalities. In all, more than 685,100 recoveries have been recorded.