Over 70 New York City Cooling Towers Test Positive for Legionnaires’ Disease Bacteria
The current outbreak continues, with over 60 confirmed cases of the respiratory illness.
Last summer, there was a significant outbreak of the respiratory illness known as Legionnaires’ disease in the Central Harlem area of New York City. At that time, seven people died, and nearly 100 individuals were diagnosed with the disease in the area.
NYC continues to be a challenging region to stay safe and healthy. My colleague Mary Chastain reported earlier this month that the New York City Health Department warned Central Park visitors about an outbreak on the Upper East Side.
The outbreak continues, with over 60 confirmed cases as of this post and over 70 buildings with cooling towers that have tested positive for Legionella bacteria.
New York City is managing a community cluster of Legionnaires’ disease cases on the Upper East Side that officials believe is tied to bacteria found in cooling towers. Towers on 76 buildings on the Upper East Side have tested positive for the bacteria, the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene said Tuesday.
Pneumonia caused by Legionella bacteria has been confirmed in 63 people this month, but no deaths have been reported.
Twelve people are now hospitalized, and 40 have been discharged from the hospital as of Tuesday night. Generally, about 1 in 10 people who get Legionnaires’ disease will die, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. There are no deaths connected to this cluster of cases.
Last year, a community cluster of cases in Harlem sent 92 people to the hospital and killed seven. Those cases were connected to cooling towers, prompting the city to enact a law in May that requires more frequent inspections of the equipment and increased fines for property owners that failed to comply.
The New York Post reports that more than half of the Upper East Side water cooling towers under investigation for a Legionnaires’ disease outbreak were cited by health officials during their most recent inspections.
The violations — issued between March 2025 and March 2026 at roughly 59% of the cooling centers in the three zip codes under the city’s probe — include failing to perform regular monitoring and cleaning and failing to submit Legionella test results to the health department, as required by law, records show.
The sites with the highest number of violations in the Carnegie Hill and Yorkville neighborhoods include 1520 York Ave., with nine violations, and 1101 Lexington Ave., with seven violations.
Both were dinged with cleaning, monitoring, chemical use and Legionella sampling infractions in February.
A total of eight cooling towers in the affected area were not collecting, recording, analyzing or submitting Legionella samples to the city, as mandated by law, since March 2025, according to records.
#US: Legionnaire's outbreak in #NYC
New York officials have discovered the likely source of an outbreak of #Legionnaires' disease in #Manhattan's Upper East Side neighborhood.Read more: https://t.co/jhku43l6hs pic.twitter.com/dhx4i4fjlC
— The American Geographical Society (@AmericanGeo) July 8, 2026
Cooling towers at the iconic Metropolitan Museum of Art and Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum tested positive for the presence of the bacteria.
NYC health commissioner Alister Martin told the news outlet that while cleanup would typically be ordered only after a second-round test, which would determine whether bacteria were alive, the city this year is calling for remediation following first-round tests, as the source of the outbreak has continued to prove elusive.
The positive test has not affected the Met’s opening hours, as it is typically closed on Wednesday and used the time to drain and disinfect the cooling tower. According to Artnews, the museum in a statement said that it would conduct a follow-up test immediately afterward. A Met spokesperson told ABC Eyewitness News that there was no risk to employees or visitors. The Guggenheim, which has already finished its remediation, similarly reported no threat to staff or attendees.
Legionnaires’ disease proves fatal in roughly 10 percent of cases.
The lack of rigor in cooling tower maintenance is troubling. Legionnaires’ disease is a serious type of pneumonia caused by Legionella bacteria, which people usually contract by inhaling mist or tiny water droplets from contaminated man-made water systems (e.g., cooling towers, showers, or hot tubs).
Symptoms typically begin 2–14 days after exposure and include cough, fever, shortness of breath, muscle aches, and headaches. The disease is not generally spread person-to-person and is treatable with antibiotics, but it can be life-threatening, especially for older adults or those with weakened immune systems.
New York City officials clearly understand the risks, but enforcement gaps and repeated violations suggest that awareness is not translating into consistent compliance when and where it matters most.
I suspect there will be a lot of drama and noise from the NYC mayor and his officials, but I predict there will be little meaningful reform. Mamdani’s war on landlords will do little to improve the situation, and I assert it is likely to make it worse.
🦠 Mamdani: City aware of UWS building testing positive for Legionella as UES cluster hits 59 cases
🎤 @winsjuliet reports
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— 1010 WINS on 92.3 FM (@1010WINS) July 13, 2026
Nonetheless, let’s hope that the current remediation activities finally contain this cluster and that the new outbreak ends with no deaths.
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Comments
63 cases in a city of millions seems like a media-hyped nothingburger.
Yeah, and it’s not contagious. It must be caught from contaminated water sources. That’s a low probability occurrence, so large scale illness is unlikely even considering population size. The risk is localized to the immediate areas of the contaminated cooling towers.
The “immediate areas of the contaminated cooling towers”, though, is a large building with lots of people in it, and lots of people moving on the streets immediately below it.
But, yes, it’s a bit like the screeching about ebola in the Congo every summer, when it is largely contained to central Africa.
I think the urgency here is not “we’re all gonna die” but “New York infrastructure is breeding dangerous stuff.”
Cooling towers at the iconic Metropolitan Museum of Art and Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum tested positive for the presence of the bacteria..
Yeah, and I mean who even goes to the MOMA or the Guggenheim? Only out-of-towners, who all fly off to their home cities. No real New Yorker who matters is gonna get it so who cares?
Thank you for yet again vindicating my low opinion of the internet.
So according to the CDC, each of us could be carrying little colonies of Legionella around in our cars’ windshield washer reservoirs.
“Use only genuine windshield washer fluid!” we are warned.
In the culture where I grew up, genuine windshield washer fluid was called water — that is, assuming your car had a windshield washer in the first place.
Just water is definitely NOT the way to go if you live where it snows or ices with any kind of regularity.
Yet still another further different cause for panic among those who believe what’s on the TV internet.
The media liked having the opportunity to say explosive diarrhea! on air.
Legionnaires’ Disease doesn’t cut even though people have died.
Has the EPA put it on the endangered species list yet?
So they’ve shut off the cooling towers and sterilized them, right?
Right?
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