Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone said the county now meets four of the seven criteria necessary for reopening, but will not be ready to do so by Friday, the day the PAUSE order ends.

On a day when Suffolk's Covid-19 cases topped 40,000, county executive laments that World War II veterans, the most vulnerable to the virus, cannot be celebrated with public expressions of appreciation.

Health experts say it’s still too early to gauge with absolute certainty the impact of antibodies on Covid-19 and whether they will guard against reinfection long term, “but we have to hang our hat on something,” said Dr. George Dempsey of East Hampton Family Medicine.

For the second day in a row, the number of patients hospitalized with confirmed Covid-19 cases in Suffolk County rose, though the county still met a 14-day decline in overall hospitalizations based on a three-day rolling average of that figure.

In an effort to limit the number of people at East Hampton Village beaches, the village announced on Monday that beach parking permits will be required and no daily parking passes will be issued starting May 15.

The number of Covid-19 hospitalizations in Suffolk County rose in the past 24 hours, marking an end to 13 straight days of declining hospitalizations, and possibly dealing a setback to plans to reopen after the New York on Pause mandate is lifted on May 15.

There are now 813 people in hospitals across the county, down from a peak of 1,658 on April 11. However, there were 889 new Covid-19 cases reported by Sunday as of 3 p.m.

The Hampton Jitney is taking reservations in anticipation of restarting limited service for essential travel on Thursday and is running "training trips to practice new safety protocols."

Even as he looked back on April as "a month of tremendous pain and grief" in which Suffolk lost over 1,100 residents, County Executive Steve Bellone also struck a hopeful tone in his press briefing on Friday afternoon, pointing to signs of "inspiration, strength, and resiliency."

State officials do not think it’s possible to reopen schools this year "in a way that would keep our students and educators safe.”