Appearing Friday on CNN’s New Day, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) said his city will deplete its ventilator supply as it ramps up its fight against the deadly spread of the Chinese coronavirus.
(Watch from 4:25)
“The nation is in a peace time stance while we’re actually in the middle of a war,” @NYCMayor says about supply shortage. “If they don’t do something different in the next few days… then you’ll see first hundreds and later thousands of Americans die who did not need to die.” pic.twitter.com/4H1KFsisY2
— New Day (@NewDay) April 3, 2020
A partial transcript is as follows:
JOHN BERMAN: You’ve talked about Sunday as a critical day, when you’re going to be running out of things that you need. How close are you to meeting the challenge yourself to get those supplies?
MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO: I can get to Sunday, when it comes to ventilators. Monday, Tuesday, I’m not sure about yet. That’s the blunt truth, John. I’m not sure if the nation’s largest city, after we have asked our federal government constantly, we’ve gone to every company we can find literally on earth that we could purchase from. We’re trying to create homegrown solutions, we’re trying to come up with every creative way and approach. But I don’t know after Sunday if we’re going to have what we need, and that’s just the ventilators.
The toughest part of the equation is the people part, the personnel. Think about this: We predict by something like Monday or Tuesday, 5,000 people in our ICUs intubated, fighting for their lives, with COVID cases, that number will then grow. That’s a staggering number. Every one of those people need a ventilator, every one of those people needs doctors and nurses constantly checking on them and adjusting their treatment.
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