The Cuomo Administration has been taking a beating in the media over its months-long refusal to disclose public information to reporters and watchdog groups about COVID-19 deaths in nursing homes and other similar non-hospital settings.\u00a0 The Legislature, a co-equal branch of government, had also been stonewalled by the Cuomo Administration.\u00a0 Republicans have called for the governor to be impeached and for a special session to be called to address the Administration\u2019s failures.\u00a0 Democrats have threatened to subpoena Administration officials and to hold public hearings on the issue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This week\u2019s public hearing on the governor\u2019s proposed health budget is likely to produce significant fireworks as the Health Commissioner will face lawmakers for the first time since the Attorney General\u2019s January report<\/a> was released documenting 50 percent more nursing home deaths from COVID than had been reported by the Cuomo Administration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While it is important for the legislative branch to get to the bottom of Administration\u2019s apparent effort to sit on evidence of what may have been a tragic failure in COVID policy, an important additional issue should be explored as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In addition to identifying the previously undisclosed nursing home deaths, the Attorney General\u2019s report found that nursing homes that scored poorly in federal reports on quality of care had the highest fatalities. According to the AG, \u201cNursing homes that entered the pandemic with low U.S. Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS) Staffing ratings had higher COVID-19 fatality rates.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Of course, if the federal reporting is accurate, it would not be surprising that the nursing homes with the lowest scores \u2013 and therefore the poorest quality of care \u2013 would be the ones that had the worst performance in protecting residents from COVID. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But if the feds had been reporting that performance, why hadn\u2019t state regulators acted prior<\/em> to the pandemic? Why did it take COVID and the Attorney General\u2019s report to bring it into the public spotlight?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Advocates for seniors and others in care facilities were well aware of this information and had long been complaining about poor quality of care. As one advocate for nursing home residents commented<\/a>, \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of neglect in nursing homes in the best of times and these are not the best of times.\u201d. But those concerns, apparently, had been ignored by state health officials. As a result, nursing homes residents and their loved ones suffered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Where was the Cuomo Administration\u2019s Health Department? The governor has been in office for over a decade, yet it appears that too little was done to react to the federal government\u2019s reports.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Struggles with infections \u2013 not just those from COVID \u2013 are a problem statewide. This is deeply troubling in places designed to tend to those sick and frail. New York State hospitals tend to perform worse<\/a> than the national average when it comes to infections. <\/p>\n\n\n\n