New York comptroller audit concludes Cuomo admin undercounted COVID nursing home deaths

An audit launched on Tuesday by the New York State authorities concluded that the administration of former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo did not precisely account for the variety of New Yorkers who died from the coronavirus in nursing houses.

In response to an audit launched Tuesday by New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli, Cuomo’s Well being Division did not account for 4,100 nursing dwelling deaths and undercounted the coronavirus demise toll in nursing houses by as a lot as 50% from April 2020 to February 2021.

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“Households have a proper to know if their cherished one’s COVID-19 demise was counted, however many nonetheless don’t have solutions from the state Division of Well being,” DiNapoli mentioned in a assertion launched with the audit. “Our audit findings are extraordinarily troubling. The general public was misled by these on the highest degree of state authorities by distortion and suppression of the information when New Yorkers deserved the reality. The pandemic shouldn’t be over, and I’m hopeful the present administration will make adjustments to enhance accountability and shield lives. An essential step can be for DOH to offer the households who misplaced family members with solutions as to the precise variety of nursing houses residents who died. These households are nonetheless grieving, they usually deserve no much less.”

The audit states that the well being division fell “properly brief” of its “ethical” and “moral” obligation to precisely report the deaths.

In a press release to Fox Information, Cuomo spokesperson Wealthy Azzopardi steered the discharge of the audit had politically primarily based motives.

On this screenshot from the DNCC’s livestream of the 2020 Democratic Nationwide Conference
(Photograph by Handout/DNCC through Getty Photographs)

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“Because the variety of out-of-facility deaths have been reported final January this isn’t information, nonetheless what’s peculiar is the Comptroller’s launch of this audit now — however nobody has ever accused him of being above politics,” Azzopardi mentioned. 

The Manhattan District Lawyer’s workplace introduced earlier this yr it might not criminally cost Cuomo in connection along with his dealing with of nursing dwelling deaths which he was extensively criticized for throughout his time in workplace.

An investigation was opened after a report final yr by New York Lawyer Common Letitia James revealed that the state’s Division of Well being underreported COVID-19 deaths in nursing houses by as a lot as 50%.

Cuomo had directed nursing houses to just accept sufferers who examined optimistic for or have been suspected of getting COVID-19 early in his pandemic response, a transfer that grew to become controversial after 1000’s of aged sufferers grew to become contaminated with the virus.

“Because the pandemic and our investigations proceed, it’s crucial that we perceive why the residents of nursing houses in New York unnecessarily suffered at such an alarming fee,” James mentioned in a press release on the time. “Whereas we can not carry again the people we misplaced to this disaster, this report seeks to supply transparency that the general public deserves and to spur elevated motion to guard our most weak residents.”

 New York Governor Andrew Cuomo arrives to depart in his helicopter after saying his resignation in Manhattan, New York Metropolis, U.S., August 10, 2021. REUTERS/Caitlin Ochs
(REUTERS/Caitlin Ochs)

A separate investigation carried out by the New York Meeting concluded in November that the Cuomo administration “materially misrepresented” knowledge on nursing dwelling COVID-19 deaths, with one lawmaker saying the revelations would have been grounds for impeachment if Cuomo was nonetheless in workplace.

Fox Information’ Michael Lee contributed to this report