New Yorkers, of course, have the reputation of being proud of being tough and resilient, and New York will get through this as the entire country will.

But at this moment, the Big Apple is battling what so many cities and towns will likely fight in the days and weeks ahead.

So for those of you who are not experiencing it yet, we want to give you a glimpse of the change and paralysis in this typically vibrant city.

In just a matter of weeks.

Are David Wright leads us off?

New York is still the city that never sleeps, but sleepless nights now means something totally different here.

The only sound of New York hustle and bustle is the whale of the ambulances.

Everyone knows what that means.

Another New Yorker fighting to stay alive and first responders rallying to their side.

If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere that had a lot of my providers and their shifts in tears.

Um, it's it's more than any of us signed up for it.

No longer is it upto us if it ever waas, the virus has stripped that illusion away.

We New Yorkers are having to accept the fact that something larger than ourselves is calling the shots way here right now.

Working.

Thank you.

You're gonna be here tomorrow.

Wait, you guys, it's up to us to act responsibly.

New Yorkers are doing that for the most part.

As of tonight, 17% of the NYPD is out sick.

More than 1200 police officers so far have tested positive for Corona virus.

But crime in the city is down overall, in parks and in public, most of us are keeping our distance.

Grand Central Station at rush hour is quiet as a crypt in Times Square.

The billboards heir lit up, but no tourists to see them.

New York is an island.

The bridges and tunnels are open, but traffic is a breeze.

There may be no better illustration of the impact this has on the economy of this city and the nation than at the heart of American capitalism.

The New York Stock Exchange as of last week, no traders on the floor.

It's all Elektronik behind you.

So is most of America.

The moment cocooned in our homes, connected to each other by Ethernet and WiFi the least we have that we need it to teach our kids.

She's just back to the body, your eyes in the back seat islands before you blink your eyes to organize play dates and social gatherings and to order our groceries and other necessities.

These are the foot soldiers in the war on the virus, the Internets, infantry gloves and masks, now an essential part of the uniform.

For every doorman in Queens where many of these foot soldiers live, the epidemic is at its worst Elmhurst Hospital there, now bursting at the seams with Corona virus patients.

This is a mostly working class community, crowded with immigrants not far from where the president of the United States was born.

I've been watching that for the last week on television body bags all over in hallways.

I've been watching them bring in trailer trucks, freezer trucks, the freezer trucks because they can't handle the bodies.

There's so many of them.

This is in my essentially in my community and Queens, Queens, New York I've seen things that I've never seen before.

Many of the people in Elmhurst work hourly jobs without health benefits.

Many families save on rent by having multiple generations share one apartment anxiety, depression.

Not much to do our home just clean, sanitize Everything could stay home a little bit of argument here and there with family members.

But you know, I'm having faith in God and praying every single day.

Keeping everything clean could be a challenge when there's no place to wash your clothes like we haven't done the lucky for like, a week and all the stores are closed on.

We finally found one that was actually open, and they would like a lot of people here to get away for a good hour to hour.

Just laundry.

New York already knows that the hospitals will soon be at their limit.

So the next Grand Slam at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Queens won't be the U.

S.

Open.

It'll be hundreds of Corona virus patients in Central Park.

The normal rites of spring have given way to a field hospital and at the Javits Center downtown, where they often host Comic Con Hospital reminiscent of Ellis Island and the era of Spanish flu.

This is going to be one of those moments that going to write about and they're going to talk about for generations.

This is a moment that is going to change this nation.

10 years from now, you'll be talking about today to your Children or your grandchildren, and you will shed a tear because you will remember the lives lost and you'll remember the faces.

And you'll remember the names New Yorkers have faced tough times before, even in living memory.

And we've overcome them.

But even by New York standards, this is big back.

Yet.

To quote Dorothy Parker, New Yorkers know if you can get through the twilight, you'll live through the night.

Our thanks to David Wright.

Hi, everyone, George Stephanopoulos here.

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