New York opens – a garden party

Published: April 26, 2021 KL 00.56

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It’s a party in New York. Restrictions have eased and the community begins to open up.

In the parks, the war party appears to be the end, says Emily Svenson, Afftonbladet’s US correspondent.

In April of last year, stores and shops in New York gear up for a world of mouthguards, rubbing alcohol and plastic gloves. The city closed off and ambulances remained virtually alone on the streets.

Photo: Frank Franklin II / TT

Times Square because we’re not used to seeing it. April 2020.

Aftonbladet Bear Bjorman Wrote on how “The virus has engulfed the city of the world like a biblical curse, leaving behind tens of thousands of deaths, astonishing sadness, ghostly emptiness and silence in streets that are usually vibrating with electrical movement – around the clock.”

TotalFest I Park

The city is now preparing to return to a more normal life. Schools, gyms and museums were opened. The bars are open until midnight.

On the streets, which echoed ghostly a year ago, there is a folk festival. Pictures from the city show open restaurants, and crowds sitting in parks and along the sidewalks

The fact that the vaccination coincides with spring made people go out more in restaurants, eat more, and, as was the case, see each other again, says Aftonbladet’s US correspondent Emily Svenson.

– It was an entire party at a local park in Manhattan yesterday as people cranked each other up and roasted. It looked amazing, as if it was 2019.

The infection continues to spread

In total, about 30 percent of the city’s adult population has now been vaccinated, and according to Mayor Bill de Blasio, the goal is for all citizens to be vaccinated by the end of spring.

The number of daily new cases remains among the highest in the country, but has declined rapidly – from an average of 16,600 new cases per day in January to about 6,000 at the end of April.

Published: April 26, 2021 KL 00.56

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