Attorney General James Says the State Underreported Death in Nursing Homes, Which Blame Cuomo

  Although Gov. Andrew Cuomo spent 25 minutes in his press briefing yesterday blaming former President Donald Trump for mismanaging the COVID-19 pandemic, today, Attorney General Letitia James released a report that points a finger at the governor, who has been widely criticized over his March advisory directing nursing homes in the state to accept patients who had or were suspected of having COVID-19.

    As the nursing home residents were medically stable, the notice said, it was appropriate to move in the patients. Further, nursing homes were prohibited from requiring that medically stable prospective residents be tested for the virus before they arrived.

     After the attorney general received allegations of patient neglect that may have jeopardized the health and safety of nursing home residents and employees, in March James launched an investigation that just revealed that as many as 50% more nursing home residents died from COVID-19 in New York that the state’s Department of Health (DOH) originally reported.

    James’s investigations also revealed that nursing homes’ lack of compliance with infection control protocols put residents at increased risk, and that the facilities that had higher COVID fatality rates also had lower staffing ratings before the pandemic, the Post-Journal reported.

   Based the report’s findings and subsequent investigation, James is conducting ongoing investigations into more than 20 nursing homes whose reported conduct during the first wave of the pandemic that presented particular concern.

      “As the pandemic and our investigations continue, it is imperative that we understand why the residents of nursing homes in New York unnecessarily suffered at such an alarming rate,” James said. “While we cannot bring back the individuals we lost to this crisis, this report seeks to offer transparency that the public deserves and to spur increased action to protect our most vulnerable residents. Nursing homes residents and workers deserve to live and work in safe environments, and I will continue to work hard to safeguard this basic right during this precarious time.”

      “These are our loved ones we lost, it is someone’s grandma, mother or father,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio this morning. “Families are missing someone dear to them. For so many people I talk to who have lost folks, and they could not be with them. It could not be more horrible.

     “We have to make sense of this and get the full truth. We have to be honest about the numbers, and make sure that this never happens again.”

 (Mike Groll/Office of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo)