{"id":332420,"date":"2026-08-29T02:28:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-29T02:28:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/332420\/"},"modified":"2026-08-29T02:28:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-29T02:28:09","slug":"nyc-legionnaires-outbreak-death-toll-reaches-11-officials-insist-disease-no-longer-spreading","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/332420\/","title":{"rendered":"NYC Legionnaires’ outbreak death toll reaches 11, officials insist disease no longer spreading"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two more people died from the Upper East Side Legionnaires\u2019 disease outbreak<\/a>, raising the death toll to 11 \u2014 but health officials on Friday said the cluster is no longer spreading.\u00a0<\/p>\n

New York City Health Commissioner Dr. Alister Martin announced that the city\u2019s \u201cdisease investigators confirmed two additional deaths connected to the Upper East Side Legionnaires\u2019 disease cluster,\u201d in a statement shared Friday.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWe are deeply saddened by every life lost, and our hearts are with the families and loved ones who are grieving,\u201d the health official said.<\/p>\n

NYC Health Commissioner Dr. Alister Martin announced the death toll of the Upper East Side Legionnaire\u2019s disease outbreak rose to 11 in a statement shared Friday. Gregory P. Mango for NY Post<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no evidence of ongoing transmission as the last diagnosis was more than six weeks ago,\u201d Martin said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Big Apple has seen a total of 94 cases and 11 deaths from this summer\u2019s Upper East Side cluster<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Nearly 80 people were admitted to hospital from the summer outbreak but Martin confirmed \u201cthere are now no patients hospitalized with this illness,\u201d adding that \u201cthe last remaining patient has recovered and returned home.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Metropolitan Museum of Art was one of dozens of buildings which tested positive to Legionella bacteria in its water cooling towers this summer. Helayne Seidman for the NY Post<\/p>\n

City Council Speaker Julie Menin<\/a>, who lives on the Upper East Side, said she was \u201csaddened by the news that two additional New Yorkers died.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cThe toll this outbreak has had on dozens of impacted families, and on our neighborhood as a whole, is truly devastating,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Menin announced that the \u201cCity Council will closely examine how this tragic outbreak occurred<\/a> and what additional actions and policies are needed to better protect New Yorkers\u201d during their hearing next Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Several ritzy Upper East Side schools, including All Souls Church on Lexington Avenue, also tested positive for Legionella. Helayne Seidman for the NY Post<\/p>\n

Martin said scientists will continue to work on matching samples from contaminated water cooling towers with samples from patients sickened by the disease.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The city expects the findings in September and will be shared publicly.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The death toll from the outbreak on the Upper East Side surpassed last year\u2019s deadly Harlem cluster \u2014 where seven people died from the disease.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Cooper Hewitt was linked to the Upper East Side\u2019s Legionnaires\u2019 disease outbreak. Helayne Seidman for the NY Post<\/p>\n

More people, however, were sickened in the Harlem outbreak, with a total of 114 cases and 90 hospitalizations, according to city data.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

Dozens of water cooling towers atop buildings on the Upper East Side tested positive<\/a> for the bacteria behind this year\u2019s outbreak \u2014 including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Cooper Hewitt, the Guggenheim Museum and several ritzy private schools.<\/p>\n

But in Harlem last year, water cooling towers above city-owned properties, including Harlem Hospital, were linked to the grim outbreak.<\/p>\n

Grieving families and survivors of the deadly 2025 Harlem cluster sued the Big Apple earlier this month<\/a> in a trio of lawsuits \u2014 including a wrongful death claim involving five of the seven people who died.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two more people died from the Upper East Side Legionnaires\u2019 disease outbreak, raising the death toll to 11…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":332421,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[301,1015,5236,5237,8467,57,9,24,56,63,65,64,3610,466,58],"class_list":["post-332420","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-city-council","tag-deaths","tag-diseases","tag-health-department","tag-legionnaires-disease","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-public-health","tag-upper-east-side","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332420","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=332420"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332420\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/332421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=332420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=332420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=332420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}