Queens Hospital Sees “Apocalyptic” Surge In Patients, Refrigerated Truck Stationed Outside To Hold Bodies

The New York Times reports:

In several hours on Tuesday, Dr. Ashley Bray performed chest compressions at Elmhurst Hospital Center on a woman in her 80s, a man in his 60s and a 38-year-old who reminded the doctor of her fiancé. All had tested positive for the coronavirus and had gone into cardiac arrest. All eventually died.

Elmhurst, a 545-bed public hospital in Queens, has begun transferring patients not suffering from coronavirus to other facilities as it moves toward becoming a facility dedicated entirely to the outbreak. Doctors and nurses have struggled to make do with a few dozen ventilators.

Calls over a loudspeaker of “Team 700,” the code for when a patient is on the verge of death, come several times a shift. Some have died inside the emergency room while waiting for a bed. A refrigerated truck has been stationed outside to hold the bodies of the dead. Over the past 24 hours, 13 people at Elmhurst had died.

Read the full article. Whoa.

NEW: 13 Deaths in a Day: At Elmhurst Hospital in Queens, an “apocalyptic” surge of coronavirus patients is beginning, with devastating consequences: https://t.co/Mk089w8Bzb (by @mrothfeld, @SominiSengupta, @JoeKGoldstein and me, plus the rest of @NYTMetro) #CoronavirusNewYork

— Brian M. Rosenthal (@brianmrosenthal) March 25, 2020