Vids show hosps deal with corpses by the truckload
Disturbing videos captured in Brooklyn and posted online paint a grim picture on how hospitals seem to be struggling to deal with bodies as they battle against the wave of coronavirus infections.
One video shows covered bodies on gurneys sitting on the sidewalk, while another shows body bags holding corpses being loaded into a trailer using a forklift outside a different hospital.
“This is real, y’all, this is for real,” a man can be heard in the video saying as he films the forklift outside Brooklyn Hospital Center in Fort Greene. “This is for real, this is real, this is right here in Brooklyn.”
The video shakes as he watches the forklift move toward the trailer.
“They’re putting the bodies into an 18-wheeler,” he says in the video. “Please stay inside, this is for real.”
The video was posted to Facebook by Corey Teague, who told the Daily News it was provided to him by someone who did not wish to be identified.
Calls and emails to Brooklyn Hospital Center for comment were not immediately returned.
In the other video, filmed outside Maimonides Medical Center in Borough Park and posted to YouTube and shared on Twitter by rapper Ice-T among others, an unidentified person films with his cell phone what he calls covered bodies on gurneys sitting out on the sidewalk before they are loaded into a trailer.
The video appears to be taken by someone in medical gear who is part of the crew handling the corpses.
“Bodies, body, body,” the freaked-out filmer, wearing a surgical mask, says in the video as he moves the camera from one gurney to the next. “There’s a truck that we’re gonna put the f—-ing bodies into, bro.”
“Maimonides regrets that anyone was able to obtain video of this nature,” Maimonides spokeswoman Eileen Tynion told the Daily News. “We’re working very hard to provide accurate accounts of all the good work being done to care for COVID patients, and the stories of many people who have recovered and gone home.”
Hospitals in the city have been forced to resort to drastic measures in order to cope with COVID-19.
And the city medical examiner has set up tents and refrigerated trucks outside its headquarters in Murray Hill in case it overflows its capacity of about 900 bodies. The outdoor operation can accommodate about 3,600 cadavers.
“This is a deadly, serious situation,” Gov. Cuomo said of the continued spread of coronavirus on Monday. “The virus does not discriminate. It attacks everyone and everywhere.”
The death toll in the city has hit 790, with confirmed cases of coronavirus at more than 36,200, the governor said.