Cathedral turned into hospital as US toll nears 11k

WASHINGTON/ TORONTO: A vast cathedral in central New York is being converted into a field hospital during the coronavirus pandemic, its dean said Monday, as the US struggles to cope with the mounting crisis.

The death toll in the country is nearing 11,000, while the nationwide cases stood at more than 367,000. Authorities have warned Americans to brace for worse in the coming weeks.

The Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine in Manhattan will house nine climate-controlled medical tents in its 600foot-long nave and subterranean crypt, dean Clifton Daniel told The New York Times.

The tents will be able to hold a total of at least 200 patients beneath the stained-glass windows of the building, which describes itself as the largest Gothic cathedral in the world.

“In earlier centuries, cathedrals were always used this way, like during the plague. So this is not outside the experience of being a cathedral, it is just new to us,” Daniel said.

Cathedral officials said Covid-19 patients could start arriving within a week.

The field hospital will be staffed with personnel from the Mount Sinai Morningside Hospital, located next door to the cathedral complex.

US President Donald Trump said his administration reached a deal for 3M Co. to provide an additional 55.5 million masks a month for US health care workers and others fighting the coronavirus outbreak.

“So the 3M saga ends very happily,” Trump said at a White House news conference Monday.

Trump has said he invoked the Defense Production Act to ban the export of supplies needed to fight the coronavirus pandemic, triggering a fight with 3M and allies including Canada. He’s used the act and his public pulpit to excoriate companies he sees as not fully cooperating with the government’s efforts to fight the virus.

Under the new deal, 3M will import the additional respirator masks - a total of 166.5 million over a three-month span - primarily from its manufacturing facility in China, the company said in a statement. The supply will supplement 3M’s current output of 35 million masks a month from a pair of US facilities.

3M said it will be allowed to continue exporting some masks to Canada and Latin America from the US.

In neighbouring Canada, the disruption in normal life could last up to “several months”, according to the country’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Canada has so far reported over 16,500 cases and at least 323 deaths. Restrictions remain in place across the country, though a nationwide lockdown has not been enforced.

Addressing the issue, Trudeau said, “To stay at home, to continue this period of isolation and distance is the best way to get out as quickly as possible, but certainly it will be a case of several weeks, perhaps several months.”