Tag Archives: hospital ships

Hospital Ship USNS Comfort to Start Accepting COVID-19 Patients

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The USNS hospital ship Comfort is seen docked at Pier 90 on Manhattan’s West Side as the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues in New York City, New York, U.S., April 7, 2020. REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz

The U.S. Department of Defense has opened the hospital ship USNS Comfort to patients with COVID-19 in order to relieve pressure on New York area hospitals, the Northern Command announced Tuesday.

“Effective immediately, USNS Comfort will accept trauma, emergency and urgent care patients without regard to their COVID-19 status,” the Northern Command said in a statement.

The Military Sealift Command hospital ship USNS Comfort (T-AH 20) arrived in New York on March 30, 2020, bringing with it 1,000 hospital beds and hundreds of medical staff in support of the nation’s COVID-19 response efforts. Its intention was to serve as a referral hospital only for non-COVID-19 patients admitted to shore-based hospitals.


The USNS Comfort passes Manhattan as it enters New York Harbor during the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in New York City, U.S., March 30, 2020. REUTERS/Mike Segar

Despite the extra capacity that the ship brings, the government has come under fire for it being underutilized with only about 20 patients admitted on board as of last Thursday, the New York Times reported.

A makeshift hospital set up at New York’s Javits Center continues to serve as the U.S. Department of Defense’s primary facility for treating COVID-19 patients. It is now also accepting COVID-19 patients.

“For the Comfort to really … be a part of the relief for the pressure on the New York City hospitals, we have to be able to do this,” said Navy Vice Adm. Andrew Lewis, Commander of the U.S. 2nd Fleet, during a telephone news conference. “This is where there are a tremendous number of patients in hospitals, most of which are COVID-positive.”

Comfort is planned to focus high severity COVID patients, with more mild cases being handled by Javits Center.

“The ability to take COVID-19 patients onboard USNS Comfort provides increased capability to care for high severity COVID-positive cases, allowing the Javits New York Medical Station to focus on lower severity COVID-positive patients,” the Northern Command said.

Crew Member Sick

Also, onboard Comfort is over 70 civil service mariners responsible for operating the ship and navigation. On Monday, Politico reported that one of those crew members had tested positive for COVID-19 and is currently being isolated along with others on the ship.

Allowing COVID-19-positive patients onboard raises further questions about the safety of workers, both medical staff and its crew members.

Vice Adm. Lewis said that to ensure the ship’s crew remains healthy, the ship has been divided into a “red zone” where patients are located and a “green zone,” where the ship’s non-medical crew operates.

“We’re fully transitioned,” Lewis said. “We’ve done some minor configurations on ship, and there is no risk to any of the patients that are non-COVID at this time. We were able to isolate within the ship non-COVID patients from the COVID-positive patients.”

Lewis also added that there are currently no plans for the hospital ship USNS Mercy, now in Los Angeles, to make the same transition.

U.S. Northern Command is leading Defense Department operations against COVID-19 in the United States.

Manhattan Cruise Terminal to Host Hospital Ship

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USNS Comfort

Manhattan Cruise Terminal and Pier 90 are set to play host to the USNS Comfort hospital ship, which is scheduled to arrive on Monday.

The hospital ship, with 1,000 beds, is set to leave Norfolk over the weekend, while work is speeding along in Manhattan to dredge the berth thanks to the Army Corps of Engineers, according to a spokesperson from the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC), which essentially oversees the city’s cruise facilities.

The dredging will be done this weekend and allows the berth to have sufficient depth to accommodate the USNS Comfort, the spokesperson told Cruise Industry News.

The ship is scheduled to stay 14 days at this point, but that could likely extend. The vessel will berth at the north end of Pier 90; it is unlikely the terminal could accommodate cruise operations at the same time.

USNS Comfort

Slightly south, Pier 88 is the city’s main cruise terminal and shares various staging areas with Pier 90.

The ship was deployed via an order from President Donald. J. Trump.

According to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, the hospital ship will expand the number of available beds. However, COVID-19 patients will not be treated aboard the vessel. Instead, it will free up hospital beds for COVID-19 patients as other patients are transferred to the ship.

The Comfort previously docked at Pier 92 in Manhattan following the 9/11 terror attacks.

Hospital Ship ‘Mercy’ Steaming to Los Angeles to Assist with COVID-19 Response

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The USNS Mercy, a Navy hospital ship, departs the Naval Station San Diego and heads to the Port of Los Angeles to aid local medical facilities dealing with coronavirus disease (COVID-19) patients, in San Diego, California, U.S., March 23, 2020. REUTERS/Mike Blake

The U.S. Navy hospital ship USNS Mercy departed her homeport at Naval Station San Diego today and is now underway to Los Angeles in support of the nation’s COVID-19 response effort.

USNS Mercy left port with over 800 Navy medical personnel and support staff who will help treat non-COVID-19 patients aboard, and relieve local hospitals ashore by providing medical care including general surgeries, critical care and ward care for adults, the Navy said in a statement.

“This will allow local health professionals to focus on treating COVID-19 patients and for shore-based hospitals to use their Intensive Care Units and ventilators for those patients,” it said.

Mercy is the first of two Mercy-class hospital ships operated by the Navy’s Military Sealift Command. It’s primary mission is “to provide an afloat, mobile, acute surgical medical facility to the U.S. military that is flexible, capable and uniquely adaptable to support expeditionary warfare. Mercy’s secondary mission is to provide full hospital services to support U.S. disaster relief and humanitarian operations worldwide.”

The Mercy-class hospital ships are equipped with 1,000 hospital beds, 11 general operation suites, 15 patient wards and 80 intensive care beds, according to the Navy’s website.

A crew of over 70 civil service mariners operate and navigate the ship, load and off-load mission cargo, assist with repairs to mission equipment and provide essential services to keep the “medical treatment facility (MTF)” up and running. Mercy’s MTF is an embarked crew of medical personnel from the Navy’s Bureau of Medicine and Surgery, which is responsible for operating and maintaining one of the largest trauma facilities in the United States.

“This global crisis demands the whole of government response, and we are ready to support,” said Capt. John Rotruck, Mercy’s Military Treatment Facility commanding officer. “Mercy brings a team of medical professionals, medical equipment, and supplies, all of which will act, in essence, as a ‘relief valve’ for local civilian hospitals in Los Angeles so that local health professionals can better focus on COVID-19 cases. We will use our agility and responsiveness as an afloat Medical Treatment Facility to do what the country asks, and bring relief where we are needed most.”

According to the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, as of Monday, there have been 536 confirmed cases of COVID-19 across all areas of LA County, including seven deaths and 90 hospitalizations.

“We’ve seen a dramatic increase over the last 48 hours and sadly, we expect positive case counts to rise dramatically over the next three weeks,” said Barbara Ferrer, Los Angeles County Public Health Director.

Statewide, California now has 1,733 confirmed cases and 27 deaths.