Multiple BronxCare Doctors Infected With Coronavirus, as Physicians Face PPE Shortage

Pictured: BronxCare staffers treat a patient at one of the controversial hospital system's facilities. Credit: BronxCare.

By Kevin Deutsch
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Doctors treating coronavirus patients at BronxCare Health System are working without protective shields and gowns, leading to multiple physicians contracting the disease, Bronx Justice News has learned.

A physician for BronxCare, formerly Bronx Lebanon Hospital, said the shortage of personal protective equipment at the system’s main facility on Grand Concourse is risking the lives of doctors in an already overloaded system, and that a staffing shortage has left each nurse treating eleven COVID-19 patients at a time.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, because they could face disciplinary action for speaking publicly about conditions at the hospital, the physician highlighted the fact that Miguel Fuentes, Jr., BronxCare Health System’s president and CEO, earned roughly $2 million in compensation last year, even as the hospital failed to stock up on basic protective gear.

Fuentes, who has helmed the system for decades, routinely rakes in multi-million dollar annual earnings. In 2008 alone, he took home $4.8 million, according to reports, and earned another $1.7 million in 2015.

Miguel Fuentes, Jr., president and CEO of BronxCare, has helmed the system for decades, pulling in millions of dollars a year in personal compensation.

BronxCare, the city’s largest voluntary, not-for-profit health and teaching hospital system, took its new name following a deadly mass shooting in 2017, during which a deranged ex-doctor at the facility killed and wounded victims on multiple floors.

Corruption and mismanagement ran rampant at the hospital even before the shooting, according to the New York Post, which reported the system was subject of a federal corruption probe; that mobsters controlled construction of its new outpatient center; and some doctors were allegedly offered per-patient bounties to drum up clinic business.

Calls to a phone number listed as the system’s media line went unanswered Tuesday.

About Kevin Deutsch 265 Articles
Kevin Deutsch is a Staff Writer for Bronx Justice News covering the criminal justice system, drugs, and DNA use by law enforcement. An award-winning journalist, Deutsch is the author of the true crime books "Pill City" and "The Triangle." He has worked on staff at the Daily News, Miami Herald, Newsday, The Palm Beach Post, and The Riverdale Press. His work has also appeared in Newsweek, Columbia Journalism Review, The New York Times, The Village Voice, The Forward, The Independent, Huffington Post, Orlando Sentinel, and the New York Post, among other publications. His numerous television appearances include spots on CNN, MSNBC, and C-SPAN's BookTV. He has also been featured in The New Yorker. A Bronx resident, Deutsch hosts the true crime podcast "A Dark Turn" on the Authors on the Air Global Radio Network.