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Shelters for homeless people in America were shaken by the Covid-19 storm 0
Others living at the shelter breathed a sigh of relief until Coleman returned last week with a positive test result for nCoV at Harlem hospital.
At another shelter, Alphonso Syville, 45 years old, said that although he tried to adapt, he still felt disturbed by persistent coughs from the man lying a few meters away from him.
Alfonzo Forney, left, and Roberto Mangual, two residents of a homeless shelter in New York.
At Delta Manor, a homeless shelter in the Bronx, Christian Cascone recalls the story of his roommate arguing with another person for refusing to wash his hands and maintain personal hygiene.
While most New Yorkers stay indoors, the Covid-19 crisis is roiling homeless shelters, a densely packed community of up to 17,000 people where social isolation can seem overwhelming.
Some prisoners released from Rikers Island prison to control the epidemic situation in detention facilities have gone to homeless shelters.
`This is really a ticking time bomb,` commented Joshua Goldfein, a lawyer at the Legal Aid Society, a legal aid organization for vulnerable people in New York.
As of April 12, 371 people in shelters in New York were infected with nCoV, of which 23 died.
Authorities rented hotel rooms, which were empty due to the lack of tourists, for at least 174 USD/night to quarantine homeless people in shelters who showed symptoms or tested positive for the virus.
Social services commissioner Steven Banks said the city will also install 24 handwashing stations and 36 portable toilets at 12 street locations for homeless people who refuse to enter shelters.
Shelters are shortening meal times and eliminating rules requiring residents to leave dormitories during cleaning periods to limit the possibility of them going out and bringing the virus back.
Closing shelters to prevent the virus from spreading is not an option.
According to experts, the scattered nature of the shelters as well as the frequent changes of residents here make it extremely difficult to apply policies to prevent the spread of the virus.
Cleaning crews prepare to disinfect the Clarke Thomas shelter on Ward Island.
In a phone interview with the New York Times last weekend, Coleman said he believed he contracted nCoV at a homeless shelter.
Coleman said for now, he is happy to have his own room, where he receives 24/7 medical care.
Stephen Mott, human resources manager at HELP USA, the organization that operates the Clarke Thomas shelter, said their facility is under great pressure, but admitted they still need to do better.
At the Catherine Street shelter in Lower Manhattan, where 100 homeless women are living, many people do not comply with recommendations such as washing their hands and staying at least two meters apart, one woman living there said.
Derek Jackson, director of law enforcement for Teamsters Local 237, a union in New York, said the city currently has about 550 employees working at homeless shelters and as of early last week, 26 people.
According to him, the city is very slow in providing masks, gloves and other protective equipment to those working at homeless shelters.
Opportunity House, a charity home in Brooklyn, currently has many elderly people with serious health problems.
David Gaynor, who lives at Opportunity House, said there was once a person here who did not know English and had a lot of difficulty describing his symptoms.
The staff only took action when they saw him kneeling on the floor and whispering the words `Ambulance, hospital`.
`People then understood he was sick,` Gaynor recalled.
Vu Hoang (According to NYTimes)