if you're over the age of 60, going outside in new york right now is a dangerous, risky task.
P(x1 or x2 or x3 or x4 or x5) =
P(x1) + p(x2 or x3 or x4 or x5) - p(x1)*p(x2 or x3 or x4 or x5) =
.33 + 0.67[p(x2 or x3 or x4 or x5)] =
.33 + 0.67[0.33 + 0.67(p(x3 + x4 + x5)] =
.33 + .2211 + .67^2[0.33 + .67[p(x4 + x5)]] =
.33 + .2211 + 0.148137 + .67^3[0.33 + .33 - .33^2] =
.33 + .2211 + 0.148137 + 0.1657504893=
0.8649874893
so, if you interact with five people every time you go out in new york city right now, you will come into infectious contact with the virus four out of every five times you go out.
mortality rates over the age of 60, and certainly over the age of 70, are consistently higher than 10%, pushing 20% in people over 80.
that means that your elderly relative has a roughly 10% chance of dying just by going to the grocery store in new york, right now. if they're really old, it's pushing 1 in 5. how many times will they go shopping this month?
please do everything you can to keep them inside.
the rest of the city needs to wait it out. it won't be long before it burns through the population, which will end the rapid spread, but then you need to stop the lingering cases from getting into these homes, potentially for months.
as for long island, note that it has a large percentage of elderly people, so a higher percentage of contracted cases will need to seek treatment. so, cases may be growing faster there, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the virus is spreading faster there, it just means that a higher percentage of the population there is more vulnerable.
that seems to also be the case in new orleans and also in detroit, where serious underlying conditions like obesity and diabetes are actually quite prevalent in the general population.