Timeline of Island’s field hospitals remains a mystery as RUMC, SIUH approach capacity treating coronavirus patients

NEW YORK, N.Y. -- As the Island’s two private hospitals near capacity treating coronavirus patients around the clock, many of the details on when the borough’s two field hospitals will open remain unknown.

The Island is set to receive an additional 1,260 hospital beds to respond to the coronavirus outbreak with the help of two field hospitals in the works.

One will be at the South Beach Psychiatric Center, which will be used to exclusively treat positive coronavirus patients, equipped with 260-beds.

Another, at the College of Staten Island, will add 1,000 beds.

But neither Gov. Andrew Cuomo nor Rep. Max Rose, who together spearheaded the push to build the CSI field hospital, have been able to provide answers on when the college’s field hospital will open, who will staff it, and whether the site will treat coronavirus patients or non-coronavirus patients.

The lack of details around when the site will open, come as Richmond and University Hospital and Staten Island University Hospital said Wednesday they were treating 458 coronavirus patients between the two sites.

Last week, the heads of the Island’s two private hospitals told the Advance they are able to expand to 829 ICU and general hospital beds combined under its surge capacity.

That means the hospitals could currently be at more than half their capacity treating coronavirus patients alone based on the number of coronavirus patients they were treating as of Wednesday.

On Tuesday, RUMC told the Advance that 70% of its general hospital beds and ICU beds were being occupied by patients being treated for coronavirus. However, the hospital could not provide an exact figure on how many non-coronavirus patients they were treating and how many beds it was currently using.

The hospitals have been unable to provide a breakdown of non-coronavirus cases in their facilities.

Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis, who represents the district the South Beach Psychiatric Center sits in, said she anticipates the site will be up and running by next week and will be used to serve as an extension to SIUH to relieve the hospital of coronavirus patients.

Malliotakis said the State Dormitory Authority (DASNY) was constructing the South Beach Psychiatric Center and still adjusting its plans and completing plumbing installation there. But DASNY directed all inquiries about its build-out to the state and declined to comment on its construction.

“Over 78,000 doctors, nurses, respiratory therapists and medical professionals from across the country signed up to volunteer and the state will match them with the staffing needs of these facilities,” Malliotakis said.

Details on the CSI field hospital are even more unclear.

Officials were able to complete the 1,000-bed field hospital at the Javits Center in Midtown Manhattan in just one week. The Center opened its doors on Monday.

And Cuomo has since announced plans for four additional field hospitals across New York City at CSI, New York Expo Center in the Bronx, the Aqueduct Racetrack site in Queens and Brooklyn Cruise Terminal to build out another 4,000 beds.

The governor initially said last week that after the Trump administration approved the CSI site and others, it would take about 10 days to build them out.

Asked Wednesday when those new field hospitals would open, Cuomo could not provide a clear timeline during a press conference with reporters Wednesday.

Cuomo said the additional field hospitals would open “when we need them,” describing them as the “last of the last resort” sites which you would still need equip and staff.

Rep. Rose, who said last week he worked with Cuomo to set up the CSI field hospital because he believed the Island’s two hospitals were “rapidly approaching capacity,” declined an interview about the field hospitals on Wednesday because he was deploying to the National Guard.

Rose plans to work at the CSI and South Beach Psychiatric Center during his deployment as an operations officer.

Instead, Rose’s office directed questions about the CSI site to the state and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

But FEMA also declined to answer any questions about the CSI or South Beach Psychiatric Center sites and told the Advance to contact the state.

The governor’s press office did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

The Army Corps of Engineers has been responsible for the transformation of civilian facilities into field hospitals, with support from the National Guard.

The Advance also reached out to the Army Corps of Engineers and the National Guard for more details. The Army Corps of Engineers would not answer questions about the timeline of the CSI or Staten Island Psychiatric Center sites, only saying that the contract to build the CSI site has not yet been awarded. Meanwhile, the National Guard directed inquiries to the state.

For the second time this week, the number of Island Coronavirus deaths hit a single one-day high of 14 on Wednesday.

On Wednesday morning the number of coronavirus related deaths on Island climbed to 91 as the number of confirmed cases reached 2,480, according to the city’s latest figures.

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Reporter Paul Liotta contributed to this report