COVID-19 cases peaked in New York state on April 7. U.S. authorities by that point had converted a New York City convention center into an auxiliary hospital, with capacity for 2,000 non-COVID patients to relieve what were then expected to be overburdened city hospitals.
The Navy dispatched a hospital ship on March 30. The Comfort arrived in New York on March 30 and treated 182 patients before transferring its last patient to a local hospital on April 26.