In scathing report, NYC Comptroller says city was not prepared for pandemic

NEW YORK - According to a scathing report by Comptroller Scott Stringer, New York City was in no way prepared when the COVID-19 pandemic began last year.

The report says that the city had a supply of N-95 masks that had already expired years earlier and found dysfunction and no city-wide plan for dealing with a pandemic.

In the report, Stringer says that the planning didn't get into gear until February 2020 at the earliest.

"The best they had was a draft plan from 2013. A plan that was never finished for seven years," Stringer said.

Mayor Bill de Blasio responded at a briefing Wednesday, saying that there is no way to fully understand a global pandemic until you're in it and that no one anticipated anything like this.

De Blasio also cited a lack of leadership at the federal level.