Bill de Blasio | Rob Bennett for the Office of Mayor Bill de Blasio City to form strategic reserve of medical supplies after coronavirus shortages

New York City will form its own strategic reserve of ventilators and medical supplies to guard against shortages like the ones it has experienced battling the coronavirus, Mayor Bill de Blasio said Tuesday.

The stockpile will include 3,000 of a new, basic type of ventilator designed by local companies over the course of a month as the city risked running out of the breathing devices for a flood of coronavirus patients. City manufacturers are also now making face shields, surgical gowns, and coronavirus test kits for the first time.


“We New Yorkers will take care of ourselves,” de Blasio told reporters Tuesday. “We have learned the hard way that we cannot depend on the federal government ... We certainly cannot depend on the global market.”

The city has signed a $10 million deal for 3,000 of the basic “bridge” ventilators, which are made by Boyce Technologies in Long Island City, Queens. They sell for $3,333 a piece, compared to as much as $50,000 for a traditional ventilator.

The low-cost ventilators can help patients who are less critical or buy time for the sickest patients until a full-service ventilator is available. Engineers scrambled to design the new machine beginning in March, and the city was prepared to use them in hospitals even without FDA approval when it looked like regular ventilators might run out in early April.

In the end, a surge in the number of patients needing ventilators slowed down and more full-service ventilators arrived in New York, so the basic machines were not used on patients.

The strategic reserve will be stocked with products that can be made in New York when possible, but the city also expects to buy supplies from elsewhere including full-service ventilators and N95 masks.

“It’s a very sobering, telling moment when I have to sit here before you and say that New York City needs its own strategic reserve because we can’t depend on the federal government at this point. It’s sobering as all hell,” de Blasio said.

He said the city has been asking for more testing supplies since January and has never had close to an adequate supply.

“No place is bearing the brunt of that neglect more than New York City,” de Blasio said. “I would hate in the future if New Yorkers faced a crisis and turned to the federal government and they said, ‘Sorry, we’re all out,’ and then New Yorkers suffered, New Yorkers died because of it.”

New York also plans to use its reserve to help other cities that lack supplies in future crises.

The city had a small stockpile of ventilators before buying 500 of the devices as part of a pandemic preparedness plan, ProPublica reported. They broke down over time and were auctioned off at least five years ago to save on maintenance costs.