New York's Health Department reported Dec. 6 eight new deaths from COVID-19 in Dutchess, Orange, Putnam, Ulster, and Westchester counties. On Dec. 7, Ulster County reported four more deaths, and Albany, Rensselaer, and Saratoga counties each reported one death. "The last time we had a weekend like that was May 16-17 when we had five deaths over the weekend," Ulster County Executive Pat Ryan said. "We have been taking some small solace that the fatalities have stayed low. To see four over the weekend is really tragic. It's definitely a reminder of the potential fatal consequences of folks not taking COVID seriously." But the worst is yet to come, as the increase of coronavirus cases from the Thanksgiving holiday has not yet arrived. "You would expect the effect of the Thanksgiving surge will probably be another week, week and a half from now," said Anthony Fauci, who was Gov. Andrew Cuomo's guest at a press briefing Dec. 7. Albany County's new COVID-19 cases topped 100 for the eighth straight day. There were 75 new cases of COVID-19 reported by the Rensselaer County Health Department on Dec. 7. Schoharie County Health Director Amy Gildemeister reported 44 active cases there, and Greene County announced 26 more COVID-19 cases. Also on Dec. 7, there were five new coronavirus cases announced in Columbia County. "The decision not to go or hold a little party at your house with a few other families or not to go out to meet with a larger group, say 6 to 8 or 10 people, for a birthday. Those are hard decisions to say no to, but those are the decisions that I am asking people to make. If we don't make these on our own, it's inevitable that there will be further restrictions and closures and I would much rather control our destiny on our own. We know we are going to have a vaccine widely available, likely in the spring, so we're talking about a few months' period. The difference between how many people we might lose in those few months could be dozens or potentially hundreds of people and that's what I'm asking people to think about," Ryan said.