Gov. Andrew Cuomo is calling on President Donald Trump to approve the construction of 4,000 additional hospital beds across the city.
The governor said he wants to build temporary hospitals ahead of the apex of Covid-19 patients crushing the hospitals, expected to take place within three weeks.
“I want to have one for each borough,” Cuomo said at Friday’s press conference at the Javits Center in Manhattan.
He added that he wants to ensure that “everyone equally is being helped and is being protected.”
The state is looking at the New York Expo Center in the Bronx, the Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens, the Port Authority-owned Brooklyn Cruise Terminal and the College of Staten Island to set up temporary hospitals similar to the one set up at the Javits Center.
New York has 44,635 Covid-19 cases and 519 deaths, according to the latest data from the governor’s office.
“That is going to continue to go up, and that is the worst news I could possibly tell the people of New York,” Cuomo said.
"The rate of the increase is slowing, but the number of cases is still going up," he added.