New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has pushed back against what he called premature demands that he reopen the state, saying more understanding of the new coronavirus is needed.
As about half of US governors partially reopen their economies over the weekend, Mr Cuomo says he needs much more information on what the pandemic is doing in his state before he loosens restrictions.
"Even when you are in uncharted waters, it doesn't mean you proceed blindly," he said on Saturday.
"Use information to determine action - not emotions, not politics, not what people think or feel, but what we know in terms of facts."
New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy echoed Mr Cuomo's slow-go restart approach, even as he reported "positive trends", including a decline in hospital patients with COVID-19.
While the number of deaths has trended lower in recent days, New Jersey's toll, second only to New York's, stood at 7742, which Murphy cited as a key reason for maintaining his stay-at-home order.
"The family, friends and neighbours who we have lost are the reason why we cannot rush our restart," he said at a news briefing.
"We need to keep seeing these lines moving in these directions before we can put New Jersey on the road back, and before we're able to responsibly restart our economy."
Georgia and Texas are leading the way in the partial reopening of businesses that were shuttered by the pandemic.
Leaders in those and several other states where the coronavirus has had less of an impact are under pressure to allow people to return to work.
Government data released this week showed 30 million Americans have sought unemployment benefits since March 21.
Mr Cuomo pointed to the roughly 900 new coronavirus cases that hospitals in New York are still reporting daily, and the fact that officials do not know where those infections are coming from, as reason to continue keeping the Empire State shut down.
The governor also released the preliminary results of a statewide antibody survey of about 15,000 people showing that 12.3 per cent had been previously infected with the virus.
As of Saturday, the number of known infections nationwide had climbed to more than 1.1 million, including about 65,000 deaths, according to a Reuters tally.
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