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With price gougers capitalizing on the public’s heightened coronavirus concerns, New York has introduced its own hand sanitizer.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo introduced “NYS Clean,” during a news conference on Monday, March 9 in Albany.
He said the product, made by state prisoners, will be provided to schools, nursing homes, prisons, municipalities, and other potential COVID-19 hotspots, with one of the first shipments being delivered to New Rochelle.
Cuomo said that the state-made hand sanitizer is 75 percent alcohol - 5 percent more than Purell - and is being produced by Corcraft Products, which is operated by the New York State Division of Correctional Industries.
Corcraft will produce approximately 100,000 gallons of the hand sanitizer weekly, with it coming in several different sized packages, Cuomo said.
“This is a superior product to the items on the market,” he added. “The current capacity is 100,000 gallons per week, and we’re going to be ramping up. We’ll be providing it to governmental agencies, schools, the MTAs, prisons, etcetera.”
“We’re going to distribute it to New Rochelle, which is a hot spot,” he said. “We’ve literally been hearing from some governments that they’re having trouble getting (hand sanitizer).”
According to Cuomo, it costs the state approximately $6.10 to make a gallon of the hand sanitizer, $1.12 to make a seven-ounce bottle and 84 cents to make a smaller sized bottle for consumers.
“This is much less expensive than anything a government could buy,” the governor said. "We are problem solvers. And there is price gouging on hand sanitizer and a high demand for hand sanitizer. What do you do? Make your own hand sanitizer? Can you do that?"
“So to Purell, to Mr. Amazon, to Mr. eBay, continue price gouging and we’ll introduce our product to the market and see what happens.”
As of midday Monday, March 9, there are now 142 positive coronavirus cases in New York:
- Westchester: 98 (16 new);
- New York City: 19 (seven new);
- Nassau: 17 (12 new);
- Rockland: Four (two new);
- Saratoga: Two;
- Ulster: One;
- Suffolk: One.
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