- HEALTH & FITNESS
New York City health department says UES Legionnaires’ cluster exposure has ended
Friday, July 31, 2026 9:27PM
N.J. Burkett has the latest on the Legionnaires’ disease outbreak.
NEW YORK (WABC) –The New York City health commissioner shared encouraging news on Friday morning about the deadly Legionnaires’ outbreak and said no one has exhibited new symptoms in two weeks
As of July 30, there were 92 cases and seven deaths, primarily affecting three ZIP codes, including the neighborhoods of Carnegie Hill and Yorkville. At least 79 people were hospitalized and five remain in the hospital, the department said
Health Commissioner Dr. Alister Martin says the
“We can confidently close this phase of our response because the incubation period being the stretch of time during which new illnesses can rise has passed,” Martin said. “Legionnaires’ disease has a 14-day incubation period, within that time frame, we have seen no new cases.”
A health department investigation led to 83 buildings being ordered to clean and disinfect their cooling towers. Fifty-nine cooling towers tested positive for live Legionella bacteria and 124 tested negative, according to the department
Inspections by the city found two cooling towers on the Upper East Side with “significant maintenance failures” including one that had never been registered with the city and was operating illegally, the department said
Those buildings were identified as 300 East 83rd Street and 1520 York Avenue. The building on 83rd Street was fined $11,000 for having an unregistered cooling tower
Officials are continuing to investigate theluster
The department said the NYC Public Health Laboratory is comparing bacterial samples from patients with samples from cooling towers that tested positive
Results from the sequencing analysis are expected by the end of August
(ABC News contributed to this report.)
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