Safety-net hospitals in central Brooklyn — hospitals of last resort that on their best days struggle for resources and staff — are getting clobbered with coronavirus patients days ahead of the expected surge.
“It’s a disaster,” said Dr. Conrad Fischer, residency program director in internal medicine at Brookdale University Medical Center. “We just had a half dozen staff just test positive. We have 17 ventilators left in the institution. Some staff can't come because they’re getting wiped out.”
The hospital has a dozen cases of Covid-19 and about 20 people under investigation, he said. Soon, Brookdale will be at capacity and doctors will need to open and expand floors, and convert office spaces into places for patients to get treatment. The hospital is down to one or two days left of personal protective equipment, Fischer said.
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“We don’t have any current data but we know there is a dire and growing need in Brooklyn hospitals for [personal protective equipment] and beds,” said Jonah Allon, spokesperson for Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo expects the surge of Covid-19 patients to come within the next 43 days, though Michael Donnelly, a data scientist at Facebook, believes New York City hospitals will reach capacity of 3,000 cases by Tuesday. Based on his modeling, hospitals could see 100 new patients an hour by March 28. Greater New York Hospital Association, which represents many private hospitals in the city, did not return a request for comment on the analysis.
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