New York lawmakers are expected to approve a bill that would grant sweeping civil- and criminal-liability protections to hospitals and health care workers treating the surge of patients infected with the coronavirus.

The statute largely lifts the threat of malpractice lawsuits at a time when New York hospitals are reeling from ventilator and protective-gear shortages and overcrowding that could force them to make wrenching choices about allocating lifesaving care.

Titled “the Emergency Disaster Treatment Protection Act,” the legislation is tucked inside the budget bill passed by the state Senate and awaiting approval of the Assembly. Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo is expected to sign the measure.

The Greater New York Hospital Association, a trade group, wrote a letter to its members Thursday, saying it drafted, advocated for the legislation and secured its inclusion into the state’s annual budget package.

An official for Mr. Cuomo’s office said the state asked hospitals to increase capacity by at least 50%, giving flexibility to meet that goal through alternative facilities including nursing homes, dormitory rooms, ambulatory centers or even a tent in Central Park.


In addition, the state has asked retired physicians and other health care workers to come back into medicine. Current state malpractice laws aren’t flexible enough for the crisis presented by coronavirus, the official said.

The state needed a law that stands behind physicians and systems. “There is no applicable standard of care when you are dealing with a pandemic crisis,” the official said.

The state’s hospital industry described it as a fair accommodation to extraordinary circumstances.

Often at the direction of state authorities, hospitals have had to rapidly expand their medical ranks, construct new space and redeploy resources, said Laura Alfredo, the hospital association’s general counsel. All of the extreme measures and patient deaths made the hospitals and their staffs more vulnerable to costly litigation, she said.


The statute’s protections aren’t unlimited. The bill doesn’t excuse intentional criminal misconduct, reckless misconduct or intentional infliction of harm to patients.

“You don’t want to protect egregious conduct. That was never our goal,” said Ms. Alfredo.

Such protections from lawsuits aren’t unprecedented. Virginia has a law that extends similar protections to health-care providers responding to declared disasters.

The New York bill doesn’t just protect physicians and nurses but the boards and administrators running the institutions. It also covers nursing homes and a number of other health-care workers. It protects them not only from tort claims but the less likely possibility of criminal prosecutions stemming from loss of life.


The immunity would also expire whenever the state of emergency Mr. Cuomo declared in March is lifted.

Arthur Caplan, a professor of bioethics at New York University Grossman School of Medicine in Manhattan, said health care workers, including students, have worried about the legal risks of providing treatment on the front lines of the crisis.

“This is a very important grant of immunity,” Dr. Caplan said. “It shows thoughtful understanding of the fact that we are in very terrible times, and we have to adjust our expectation of what’s to be provided to patients and what institutions can do.”

The immunity expands upon an earlier executive order issued by Mr. Cuomo during the coronavirus emergency.


Write to Jacob Gershman at jacob.gershman@wsj.com and Melanie Grayce West at melanie.west@wsj.com