JAVITS (MEDICAL) CENTER
Convention hall to get 2,000 beds as hospitals near capacity
The Javits Convention Center has been home to auto shows, comic book conventions and trade fairs — and now it will be converted into a 2,000-bed hospital complex to treat coronavirus patients.
Gov. Cuomo toured the sprawling 1.8 million-squarefoot Midtown complex Monday after announcing that more than 20,000 New Yorkers are currently battling the potentially deadly disease.
“You can see that New York, far and away, has the bulk of the problem,” the governor said.
Of the 20,875 cases in the Empire State, 12,339 were in the five boroughs, according to Mayor de Blasio’s office.
The troubling increase in cases led to the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s repurposing the Javits Center into four, 250bed temporary hospitals.
The Army Corps of Engineers is working to construct another facility that will add a further 1,000 beds, Cuomo said.
As of Sunday, the city’s death toll rose to 99. Statewide, 157 people have died of the virus, Cuomo said.
“I see it as a wave that will break at one point, and the question is, what is the point of the break?” the governor said. “When the wave breaks, does it crash over the health care system?”
With New York now officially under a stay-athome decree, Cuomo also announced he was issuing an emergency order mandating all hospitals in the state to increase their capacities by at least 50% to accommodate the continuously growing number of coronavirus patients.
New York has emerged as the U.S. epicenter for the fastspreading virus, and the city is dealing with the brunt of the problem.
Washington, New Jersey and California, where officials are dealing with severe outbreaks as well, have fewer than 7,000 confirmed cases combined.
Globally, more than 360,000 people have been infected by the respiratory virus, meaning New York accounts for 6% of all cases worldwide.
As New York’s numbers skyrocket, Cuomo called the current situation the “calm before the storm.”
“This is going to get much worse before it gets better,” he said, “You’re going to see more people coming into the health system than we can handle.”
In addition to the hospital capacity boost, Cuomo said he was signing an executive order that would recommend all registered nurses enlist in the escalating fight against the virus.
Roughly 13% of all infected New Yorkers are currently hospitalized.
The Food and Drug
Administration also approved New York to begin testing a pair of unproven treatments on a “compassionate care” basis for the state’s sickest patients.
One treatment involves taking plasma from a person who has been infected with the virus and injecting the antibodies into a person who is sick, according to the governor.
The state is also moving forward with tests using hydroxychloroquine and a similar anti-malarial drug, chloroquine, to treat coronavirus patients after President Trump expressed interest in the pair, which are also used to treat rheumatoid arthritis and lupus.
Dr. Deborah Birx, the
White House coronavirus task force coordinator, noted that 28% of the tests submitted from the Northeast are coming back positive, compared with less than 8% in the rest of the country.
“So to all of my friends and colleagues in New York, this is the group that needs to absolutely social distance and self-isolate at this time,” Birx said. “Clearly, the virus had been circulating there for a number of weeks to have this level of penetrance into the general community.”
Hospitals across the state are reporting they’re quickly running out of space and supplies such as ventilators, masks, gloves and gowns.
The state is sending millions of N95 masks to the city and Long Island over the next few days to alleviate the shortage.
Trump touted the federal response, telling reporters during a White House briefing that protective gear is on its way to outbreak hot spots across the country.
“FEMA is distributing 8 million N95 respirator masks and 13.3 million surgical masks across the country right now, focusing on the areas with the greatest need,” he said. “We have shipped 73 pallets of personal protective equipment to New York City and 36 pallets to the state of Washington.”
But Cuomo anticipates that those supplies won’t last long and reiterated a call for Trump to activate the DeLast fense Production Act. week the President brought up the 1950 law that would allow him to order medical companies to ramp up production of masks and other sorely needed supplies. However, Trump has so far refused to activate the law.
On Sunday, Trump claimed he was holding off because the U.S., unlike Venezuela, is not a country “based on nationalizing our business.”
Cuomo dismissed Trump’s hesitation as red-baiting nonsense.
“Yes, it is an assertion of government power on private sector companies. Yes. But so what? This is a national emergency,” the governor said.