#NY health chief Zucker claims hospitals had enough PPE during COVID-19 crisis

New York’s top health chief bizarrely claimed Wednesday that the state’s hospitals had enough personal protective equipment for nurses and doctors during the height of the coronavirus pandemic – despite widespread reports of PPE shortages, including health workers forced to don trash bags.

“Just because something is reported doesn’t mean those are the facts of what is actually happening and what’s reported on the news,” state Health Commissioner Howard Zucker said during a virtual state legislative hearing on the impact of COVID-19 on the state’s hospitals.

Zucker, who insisted he had been in contact with hospital administrators “on a regular basis,” was referring to media reports dating back to March when the coronavirus crisis was mounting in the Empire State showing hospitals’ dire struggle with the lack of much-needed PPE.

In March, The Post exclusively revealed that nurses at Manhattan’s Mount Sinai West were so desperate for the safety gear that they resorted to wearing garbage bags while treating COVID-19 patients.

“I also spoke to the physicians and the nurses in many of the hospitals and the leadership and asked these questions [about PPE],” Zucker told state lawmakers during the hearing.

“And there was,” Zucker claimed. “We provided 24 million pieces of PPE and there was available PPE to all those who needed it — granted there were different policies put into place about how to preserve some of the PPE equipment, but we were pushing also to get more PPE.”

Zucker continued, “I can tell you that in those conversations with those physicians and those nurses, they said, ‘We have the PPE that is needed.’ If there was a problem they should come back to us and we will make sure it is available.”

Those comments contradict the fact that in April New York’s biggest nurses union sued the state Health Department and two hospitals — Montefiore Medical Center and Westchester Medical Center — for failing to provide sufficient PPE, like masks and gowns, for healthcare workers during the coronavirus pandemic.

One nurse from Mount Sinai West fumed on Wednesday to The Post, saying that Zucker should resign for shooting down complaints about the lack of PPE at the hearing.

“He’s f—king clueless,” nurse Diana Torres said of Zucker. “That’s so disrespectful. The state health commissioner should resign.”

“Nurses were wearing trash bags,” Torres railed. “If there was no shortage, why were we told to ration PPE? It’s insulting.”

Zucker made the PPE comments after being grilled during the hearing by Assemblyman Dan Quart (D-Manhattan), who pressed Zucker as to what can be done to better boost the state’s PPE supply.

“There seems to be a disconnect at least from my perspective between hospital administrators — what they were telling you and nurses who were on the nightly news saying very specifically that there was not enough PPE equipment within the hospitals,” Quart told Zucker.

The assemblyman asked, “Did DOH have accurate awareness in real time of the situation on hospital floors, maybe something different than what hospital administrators were telling you?”

The issue of PPE shortages also came up during last week’s legislative hearing on nursing homes where Zucker said his agency provided 14 million pieces of protective equipment to long term care facilities.

Meanwhile, nursing home industry representatives said during one week alone in April, nursing homes burned through 12 million pieces of PPE.