Family of Legionnaires' victim to file wrongful death lawsuit

[00:00:00]And this morning, back closer to home, New York City leaders are demanding answers about whether health officials warned the public soon enough about the Legionnaires' disease outbreak.

[00:00:08]>> This comes as the death toll rises to five people. Good day, Stephanie Bertini. Stephanie, this is inching closer to last year's death toll at seven with the outbreak in Harlem.

[00:00:19]>> Yeah, it's reminding a lot of people of what happened last year in Harlem. We're tracking the numbers in connection to this outbreak now on the Upper East Side. As it stands this morning, the city health department says 82 people have tested positive for the disease.

[00:00:34]Eight people currently hospitalized.

[00:00:36]Five people have died. The attorney representing the widow of 88-year-old Robert Goldstein says there will be a lawsuit. Ida Goldstein says her husband is one of those who died in connection to the outbreak, telling us he had a two-week battle with Legionnaires' disease. Robert Goldstein was an Air Force veteran. The couple had been married for 50 years. Goldstein's attorney says they plan to sue after an investigation identifies the property owner responsible for the exposure.

[00:01:05]>> To lose him this way is hard, unbearable.

[00:01:10]For two weeks I sat by his side in the Lenox Hill ICU.

[00:01:14]I watched him suffer on life support.

[00:01:17]Every single day I had to walk back and forth from the Upper East Side apartment to the hospital to be with him.

[00:01:25]I knew the air in our neighborhood had become dangerous, but I had no choice.

[00:01:30]I had to be with my husband while he was fighting for his life on an IC ventilator.

[00:01:37]>> City Council Speaker Julie Menin criticizing the health department's response, saying information should have been sent out earlier and cooling towers disinfected sooner. Menin announced plans for new legislation to address those concerns, as well as an oversight hearing to improve the city's response.

[00:01:56]>> We owe it to our families, to their loved ones and to every New Yorker to tighten up the rules to get better communication, to have more proactive testing, to not wait till those test results come back, and to have better communication.

[00:02:10]>> In a statement the New York City Health Commissioner said the city responded rapidly and aggressively to this cluster launching an investigation with only two confirmed cases and directing every building with an initial positive test to clean and disinfect its cooling towers. The city says cooling towers at 160 buildings have been tested for Legionella bacteria. In total cooling towers at 75 separate buildings tested positive for the presence of the bacteria and live Legionella bacteria was confirmed at 33 buildings. That's according to the city. The city has been has says says rather that all of the towers now have been disinfected at all of the buildings identified.

[00:02:51]Legionnaires' disease is a form of pneumonia that is treatable but can prove deadly. It's caused by Legionella bacteria which grows in warm water and can spread in places like building cooling equipment.

[00:03:04]Now, people may contract the disease by inhaling contaminated water droplets, but it doesn't spread person-to-person according to health experts. Officials still haven't identified the source of the bacteria in connection to this recent outbreak, Tina.