NEW YORK, Dec. 28 (Xinhua) -- New York City's COVID-19 test positivity rate on a seven-day average climbed to 7.24 percent, compared with 7.07 percent one day earlier, Mayor Bill de Blasio tweeted on Monday.

File photo: Agencies

The rate topped 3 percent late November, a threshold set by the city government for signifying the arrival of a second wave of the coronavirus, and has remained above the level ever since. It topped 7 percent on Sunday.

Meanwhile, the mayor said on Monday that there were 224 new hospitalizations and 2,428 new cases of the coronavirus in the city, adding that "The end of this battle is in sight -- we can't let up the fight now."

As of Sunday afternoon, the coronavirus deaths added up to 24,973 and confirmed cases to 407,264 in NYC, according to The City, a project that tracks the spread of confirmed COVID-19 infections and fatalities in New York City, based on information provided by the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, the governor's office, The COVID Tracking Project and the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University.