De Blasio: N.Y.C. will need 15,000 ventilators

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio says that the city will require 15,000 ventilators to fight the growing coronavirus pandemic.

Video Transcript

BILL DE BLASIO: But here's the overall situation. We alluded to it many a time, but I want to just remind all New Yorkers about this. We're always going to need more of that-- supplies, that supply chain I talked about. We're going to need the masks and the N95s and the gloves, the gowns, all that. Every single week, we're going to need more of that. We're going to need the ventilators especially.

And that number that we've said, I've said, from the very beginning, 15,000 for New York City-- that number is a very specific number based on the projections we've had. That number continues to be the right number, continues-- I've told the President of the United States and everyone else I've spoken to in the federal government, that is the true number. And the second we don't need all those ventilators, we will happily share them with the rest of the country immediately.

When it comes to hospital beds, again, the goal is to take the 20,000 or so-- We started the month of March with a normal complement of hospital beds in this city that were staffed with professionals all over our hospital system. Those 20,000 are increasingly going to become all ICU beds over the month of April. That's what our hospitals will be for more and more, taking on the toughest COVID cases at the front line.

We need to build out during the month of April an amazing number of additional hotel beds, 60-- excuse me, I said hospital beds, well, I should say-- my apology, hospital beds. And hotels will be one of the ways that we achieve that. But hospital beds-- we need to build out an additional number of 65,000 hospital beds in the city of New York by the end of April.

We already have a tremendous start. The 20,000 beds, as I say, they're already there. Hospitals are now adding up to 50% more capacity, just drawing on all the space that they have, and Dr. Katz talked about this from the beginning, the ability of hospitals to quickly build out more beds, more space, more ICUs. That number will add an additional almost 10,000 beds right there.

Javits Center we've talked about, and Dr. Katz will go over this-- thousands of beds there. And then all the hotels we'll bring online increasingly. So this is going to be an epic process through the month of April to build out that capacity. But this goal is within reach. It's going to take a Herculean effort, but I'm confident it can be reached.

So now, as I turn to Dr. Katz, we're going to talk about where we are today on our hospital capacity, the building-out process, starting with our public hospital system. This is a-- this growth pattern, this building out I'm talking about, is literally going on 24/7, and a profound thanks to everyone who's participating in it.