The St Regis Hotel is going to serve as a field hospital for non-critical patients
Two iconic Manhattan hotels, the St Regis and the Palace, are to become field hospitals for non-critical patients to try to help New York City battle coronavirus.
Gov. Cuomo announced on Thursday that they would serve as hospitals for non-critical patients.
The Four Seasons already offered up its rooms to healthcare workers to stop them having to make long commutes home after grueling shifts.
Now, the Wythe Hotel in Williamsburg and Yotel, along with Room Mate Grace Hotel, are doing the same.
They are among the private businesses rushing to help the city before it becomes overwhelmed with coronavirus patients.
There are already 37,000 cases of coronavirus in New York and Cuomo is eager to get ahead of the virus before it overwhelms the city’s hospitals.
He says it is inevitable that there will be an inevitable spike over the next few weeks but the key will be slowing it to keep it at a manageable rate for the healthcare system.
Along with needing spaces for the patients, the city’s healthcare workers need personal protection equipment to keep themselves safe while treating the infected.
A wave of companies have donated masks, gowns and gloves to meet this need.
JetBlue is offering free flights to healthcare workers to get them to New York state and Herz is giving them a month of free car rental.
Goldman Sachs donated 195,000 masks, Softbank donated 1.4million masks and Restore Global has donated 150,000 overralls.
Facebook has donated 2,500 gallons of hand sanitizer, the Rihanna Foundation has donated ‘various’ supplies, L’Oreal has donated hand sanitizer as has Estee Lauder which has promised 10,000 bottles a week for four or five weeks.
Uniqlo is donating 1million masks and Amneal is donating 20,000 bottles of Hydroxychloroquine – the anti-malarial drug which has been touted as a potential cure.
Kelly Ripa and her husband Mark Consuelos have donated $1million to the state to help it battle the crisis.
Boll and Branch has donated 1,000 hospital mattresses and Wayfair, the online furniture retailer, has donated linens, sheets and pillows for field hospitals.
Walmart is giving up its parking lots and store facilities.
Niagara Bottling has donated 560,000 bottles of water, Keurig and Dr. Pepper have donated coffee and beverages for healthcare workers.
Huawei is giving 10,000 N-95 masks; 20,000 isolation gowns; 50,000 medical goggles; and 10,000 gloves
The Palace hotel is going to serve as a field hospital for non-critical care patients
Crocs is donating 10,000 pairs of shoes every day to healthcare workers
JetBlue is giving free flights to healthcare workers to get to New York City
The Office of Attorney General Letitia James had also donated 1,700 protective masks and 33,000 pairs of gloves.
On Wednesday, the Four Seasons hotel announced it was opening its doors to healthcare workers to let them stay there for free after long shifts.
Ty Warren, the hotel’s owner, said the last thing they should have to think about after an 18-hour shift is a long commute.
Their gestures of good will are among thousands that are being seen across the country.
Fashion designer Christian Siriano is putting his manufacturing operation to use to make reusable masks for doctors and nurses.
Patients wait on line outside the Elmhurst Hospital Center in Queens on Wednesday
Cuomo said on Wednesday, in an emotional press conference where he announced the total number of cases in New York had surpassed 30,000, that the spirit of New York was both what made it vulnerable to the virus and what will see it through the crisis.
Gov. Cuomo is preparing for the virus peak in weeks to come
‘We live close to one another. We’re close to one another on the streets.
‘We live in close communities. we’re close to one another on the bus. close to one another in the restaurant, in the movie theater.
‘We have one of the most dense, close environments in the country.
‘That’s why the virus communicated the way it did. Our closeness makes us vulnerable.
‘That spacial closeness makes us vulnerable.
‘But it’s true that your greatest weakness is also your greatest strength: our closeness is what makes us who we are.
‘That is what New York is. Our closeness is what makes us special; our acceptance, our openness.
‘It’s what makes us feel connected to one another, It is the closeness that makes us the human beings that we are.
‘The closeness is that New York humanity that exists nowhere else,’ he said.