The Javits Center could be turned into a 1,000-patient hospital in the next few days, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Saturday.
The huge exposition space on the West Side is one four locations identified as a potential site for an emergency “field hospital” by the Army Corps of Engineers and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the governor said in a press conference.
Other sites include the State University of New York campuses at Stony Brook and Westbury on hard-hit Long Island and the Westchester Convention Center, near the original epicenter in the state.
“That would give us a regional distribution and a real capacity if we can get them up quickly enough,” Cuomo said. He added he would be reviewing a number of sites and hopes to identify the final list of locations Saturday.
FEMA’s field hospitals are fully equipped facilities with beds, medical equipment and staff, Cuomo said. The Army Corps can set up the structures but does not provide beds, equipment or staff.
Typically, FEMA hospitals can provide 250 beds, the governor said, but he was unsure how many people the potential setups in New York would be able to hold.
The Navy is also sending the USS Comfort to New York, though the hospital ship, which has 1,000 beds and 12 operating rooms, won’t likely arrive for a few weeks.
Cuomo said he is hoping the state’s hospitals can increase capacity to 75,000 from 50,000. He has also ordered 2 million new protective masks for hospital workers, including 1 million that are being sent to New York City and 500,000 for Long Island. And the state has identified 6,000 new ventilators it can purchase to shore up the number of the vital machines for New York.
The Army Corps has also been considering using empty hotels and college dorms as potential hospital sites.