13 People Died At This NYC Hospital Within 24 Hours

New York, NY — In the midst of the coro­n­avirus pan­dem­ic, Elmhurst Hospital in New York City is report­ed­ly at a break­ing point after 13 peo­ple died there with­in a 24-hour period.

Elmhurst is at the cen­ter of this cri­sis,” said Christopher Miller, a spokesman for the city pub­lic hos­pi­tal sys­tems said in a state­ment, accord­ing to New York Post. “It’s the num­ber one pri­or­i­ty of our pub­lic hos­pi­tal sys­tem right now.”

Staff are doing every­thing in our pow­er to save every per­son who con­tracts COVID-19. But unfor­tu­nate­ly, this virus con­tin­ues to take an espe­cial­ly ter­ri­ble toll on the elder­ly and peo­ple with pre­ex­ist­ing con­di­tions,” he added.

According to hos­pi­tal offi­cials, the 545-bed hos­pi­tal is cur­rent­ly func­tion­ing at over 125% capac­i­ty, com­pared to its usu­al 80% capac­i­ty rate. The hos­pi­tal has been in des­per­ate need of pro­tec­tive equip­ment and sup­plies as well.

An ER nurse described the sit­u­a­tion at the hos­pi­tal as a “war zone,” say­ing that peo­ple have lined up out­side the hos­pi­tal, most­ly to get test­ed for COVID-19. Some patients died inside the ER with­out hav­ing been able to be treated.

At least 25 staffers from oth­er hos­pi­tals were added to Elmhurst in a 24-hour span. Ventilators and 10,000 face masks were recent­ly pro­vid­ed to the hos­pi­tal, but a lot more is need­ed to con­tin­u­ous­ly pro­vide the over­whelm­ing increase of peo­ple infect­ed with the coronavirus.

Recent reports con­firmed there are a total of 20,011 pos­i­tive cas­es of coro­n­avirus in New York City and 280 peo­ple have died.

Elmhurst staffers on the front lines are “doing a tremen­dous job with lim­it­ed resources they have,” said City Councilman Francisco Moya. But because the hos­pi­tal is “at a crit­i­cal stage,” he said that “the relief has to be there for the doc­tors and nurs­es. And quickly.”

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