North Carolina COVID Field Hospital Opens

The tent facility will treat overflow COVID-19 patients from five hospitals. NBC's Brandon Goldner reports.

LENOIR, N.C. (WCNC/NBC News) — A newly erected Samaritan’s Purse’s emergency field hospital in Lenoir, North Carolina has opened to COVID-19 patients.

The 30-bed field hospital is the only one of its kind running in the United States.

The hospital is designed to relieve bed capacity at five hospital systems in the Foothills region.

Erin Holzhauer, the medical director of the emergency field hospital, says COVID-19 cases are projected to surge in the coming weeks.

“After that follows hospital admissions,” Holzhauer says. “We’re hoping that we’re getting here just in time to be able to relieve enough pressure to keep hospitals from tipping over the edge.”

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