Governor Andrew Cuomo said Tuesday that no COVID-19 positive patients have been sent to Capital Region hospitals from downstate. But Albany Medical Center says the hospital is equipped and ready to take on patients of COVID-19 from hotspots downstate.

However, the nurses are telling a different story. As hospitals across the country are facing the impacts of the coronavirus, the nurses on the front lines of Albany med say they don’t feel protected.

“You don’t send a soldier into battle without a weapon, and that’s what we feel like is happening to us,” explains nurse Hannah Mumford.

Adding to the issues: As of Monday, the hospital said there were 45 confirmed coronavirus cases among hospital staff, a third of which were contracted on the job.

Mumford has been a nurse at Albany Med since 2014. She works primarily in the cardiac intensive care unit, where her patients are at high risk.

“We’re not scared of the virus; we are scared that there are going to be vectors bringing the virus from one patient to the next,” added the nurse.

She says masks are nowhere to be found on her floor, and instead handed out by administrators.

“What I’ve seen is administration take boxes of masks from the unit and tell me personally to my face that when we need one, I will be notified,” added Mumford.

However, Albany Med sent Spectrum News a statement, saying, “We have adequate supplies of masks and gowns to allow our staff to safely provide care to patients. We continue to follow the guidelines established by the CDC and the State Department of Health.”

Mumford says the hospital is now asking them to sanitize and reuse N-95 masks.

When asked about the process, Albany Medical Center referred to a briefing with Dr. Ferdinand Venditti, the hospital's system general director.

“N-95 masks can actually be sterilized using UV light,” Venditti said in that briefing.

The doctor says sanitizing these masks are approved and safe.

“We’ve used this process for many years, and it’s used at the University of Nebraska medical center, which is the ebola center for the United States,” Venditti said.

However, the nurses say it doesn’t replace the need for more accessible and fresh supplies.

“I don’t want to have to continually explain to my patients and their family that ‘I can’t help you right now because I don’t have access to what I need,’ " added Mumford.

Mumford has been an advocate for the nurses’ union at Albany Med. A contract dispute between the recently formed union and the hospital has been ongoing for more than a year. But she says it’s time the two come together to work for the good of the people.

“It’s not about me, It’s not about them,” Mumford said. “It’s about our patients and our family members, and there’s a small, thin line that’s keeping any of us from being a patient and a victim of this pandemic.”