New York hospitals and healthcare providers will receive some federal funding to help combat COVID-19.
Senator Chuck Schumer announced on Wednesday that New York will receive $4.3 billion of a new $10 billion fund that will be allocated for coronavirus “hot spots” like those across the New York City area and Long Island. Schumer stated the New York will get the lion’s share of these funds and that he pushed the Trump administration to quickly allocate and spend the health money, which was secured as part of the CARES Act, which is also known as ‘Corona-3.’
Schumer also added that New York will get billions more in funding in the months ahead.
“The lion’s share of hot spot funds–more than $4 billion dollars–are on the way to New York right now, and we sure need them,” said U.S. Senator Charles Schumer. “Our hospitals and providers have been the vanguard in the fight against the coronavirus. And these critical dollars will help keep the fight against the virus going strong. New York and its hospitals have been amongst the hardest hit in the nation, and with this news today, the frontline fight being waged by our health care system and its incredible workforce will continue. These are the hot spot dollars our hospitals and providers need, and the dollars they so very much deserve to keep saving lives.”
The CARES Act recently passed the Senate and included $100 billion in additional funding for new programs to provide grants to hospitals, public entities, not for profit entities, and Medicare and Medicaid enrolled suppliers and institutional providers to cover unreimbursed health care-related expenses or lost revenues attributable to the public health emergency resulting from the coronavirus. The bill also includes an additional $75 billion for this fund.
“Across the state of New York, hospitals and health systems report that they are losing hundreds of millions of dollars per month because of cancelled elective procedures, increased staffing and overtime costs, expanded bed capacity, and increased spending on supplies and equipment to meet the surge in COVID-19 patients,” said Schumer. “The strain on hospitals and health systems is felt even more acutely in regions like the New York metropolitan area where the bulk of COVID-19 patients are being treated at this time. These costs obviously do not exist evenly across the country, and it is therefore crucial that subsequent rounds of funding provide an adjustment for hot spots like New York.”
