First let me provide my take on this. The NY Health Dept is just covering Cuomo's rear... the order to put COVID patients into nursing homes is very much a driver of deaths in these homes. NY Health Dept. Asserts Cuomo Order ‘Could Not Be the Driver’ of Nursing Home Deaths in the State https://www.nationalreview.com/news...e-driver-of-nursing-home-deaths-in-the-state/ The New York State Department of Health has concluded that an executive order requiring nursing homes to readmit coronavirus patients, issued by Governor Andrew Cuomo, was not the driving factor behind coronavirus deaths in the state’s nursing homes. On March 25, Cuomo ordered nursing homes and long-term care facilities to readmit patients who had been hospitalized with coronavirus, even if the patients were not fully recovered. The order has been criticized for possibly leading to additional deaths in nursing homes, which have appeared as a major incubating ground for coronavirus. New York Health Commissioner Dr. Howard Zucker defended the state’s policy at a press conference on Monday, saying that “admission policies were not a significant factor in nursing home fatalities.” State Assemblyman Ron Kim, a Democrat representing Queens, slammed the report as a “cover-up.” “This is a conflict of interest for the health department to investigate its own poor decisions,” Kim told the New York Post. “For them to say that the decision of sending COVID-19 patients from hospitals into nursing did not contribute to increasing infections is ludicrous.” According to the new Department of Health report, the number of infections in nursing homes was driven by visits from already-infected staff or family members. Additionally, the report states that of 310 unique nursing homes that readmitted coronavirus patients from March 25 to May 8, 252 “already had a suspected or confirmed COVID-positive resident, COVID-related confirmed or presumed fatality, or worker infected prior to admission of a single COVID-positive patient—meaning the admission of a COVID patient did not introduce COVID into the nursing home as it was already present.” New York’s reported coronavirus fatality rate from nursing homes currently stands at around 6,500. However, the state only classifies coronavirus deaths as occurring in nursing homes if the patient passes away while physically present at a nursing home. If a nursing home resident dies at a hospital after having been transferred out, the death is not counted as having come from a long-term care facility. A June 30 report from the Empire Center, a think tank based in Albany, shows that the vacancy rate at nursing homes in New York soared during the coronavirus pandemic. While not all of these vacancies can be attributed to coronavirus deaths, author Bill Hammond, the center’s senior fellow for health policy, estimates that over 10,000 nursing home residents have died as a result of coronavirus.
I think you might be right, but it is just my opinion. Honestly, I don't give a shit. Voters in NY should consider this and research it before voting for an alternative (if they feel that is needed). What pisses me off is that NY CFR data drove other states and national policy in shutting down and hitting the economy, and this process was flawed. The fear from a high CFR which was skewed because of incorrect action on the NY governor's part (and lets face it, other governors who took patients and put them with the most feeble and susceptible causing an overtly high CFR) influenced hundreds of millions nationwide. And this was a colossal error in leadership - starting in NY and ending in the Oval Office, with the media driving the fear all throughout because of the political side of the narrative. Idiots all around.
Blame game? Cuomo takes heat over NY nursing home study https://apnews.com/4247aa5d314e87c994a69b49d6ad011e New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is facing blistering criticism over an internal report that found a controversial state directive that sent thousands of recovering coronavirus patients into nursing homes was “not a significant factor” in some of the nation’s deadliest nursing home outbreaks. Scientists, health care professionals and elected officials assailed the report released last week for flawed methodology and selective stats that sidestepped the actual impact of the March 25 order, which by the state’s own count ushered more than 6,300 recovering virus patients into nursing homes at the height of the pandemic. And some accused the state of using the veneer of a scientific study to absolve the Democratic governor by reaching the same conclusion he had been floating for weeks — that unknowingly infected nursing home employees were the major drivers of the outbreaks. “I think they got a lot of political pushback and so their response was, ‘This isn’t a problem. Don’t worry about it,’” said Rupak Shivakoti, an epidemiologist at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health. “It seems like the Department of Health is trying to justify what was an untenable policy,” added Charlene Harrington, a professor emerita of nursing and sociology at the University of California at San Francisco. Cuomo, who has been praised for leadership that helped flatten the curve of infections in New York, has also been criticized over his handling of nursing homes, specifically the order that told homes they could not refuse to accept recovering COVID-19 patients from hospitals as long as the patients were “medically stable.” The order barred homes from even testing such patients to see if they still had the virus. The directive was intended to free up hospital beds for the sickest patients as cases surged. But relatives, patient advocates and nursing home administrators have called it a misguided decision, blaming it for helping to spread the virus among the state’s most vulnerable residents. Cuomo reversed the order under pressure May 10, long after New York’s death toll in care homes had climbed to among the highest in the nation. To date, nearly 6,500 deaths have been linked to the coronavirus in the state’s nursing home and long-term care-facilities. But the 33-page state report flatly says “that nursing home admissions from hospitals were not a driver of nursing home infections or fatalities.” Instead, it says the virus’ rampant run through New York nursing homes was propelled by the 37,500 nursing home workers who became infected between mid-March and early June and unknowingly passed the virus on. The report noted that the number of residents dying at nursing homes peaked on April 8, around the same time as COVID-19 deaths statewide, but nearly a week before the peak of coronavirus patients being transferred from hospitals. It also said 80% of the 310 nursing homes that admitted coronavirus patients already had a confirmed or suspected case among its residents or staff before the directive was issued. And it contends the median number of coronavirus patients sent to nursing homes had been hospitalized for nine days, the same period that the study said it likely takes for the virus to no longer be contagious. “If you were to place blame, I would blame coronavirus,” Dr. Howard Zucker, the state health commissioner, told reporters last week. Cuomo said in a later news conference that“ugly politics” were behind “this political conspiracy that the deaths in nursing homes were preventable. And now the report has the facts, and the facts tell the opposite story.” But several experts who reviewed the report at the request of The Associated Press said it has fatal flaws, including never actually addressing the effect of the order. Among the questions not answered: If 80% of the 310 nursing homes that took coronavirus patients already had cases before the order, what was the effect of the released patients on the other homes that were virus free? If the median number of patients were released into nursing homes for nine days, that means that by the study’s own count more than 3,000 patients were released within nine days. Could they have been infectious? Denis Nash, an epidemiologist at the City University of New York School of Public Health, also noted that New York’s nursing home death toll doesn’t include nursing home residents who died at a hospital, a “potentially huge problem” that undercounts the virus’ toll and could “introduce bias into the analysis.” Among the holes in the study highlighted by University of Texas, Houston, epidemiologist Catherine Troisi was a lack of data on what happened at dozens of nursing homes that had no COVID-19 infections before those sick with the virus were sent to them. “Would this get published in an academic journal? No,” Troisi said. Shivakoti said he thinks the report may be correct in concluding that the major drivers of the outbreaks were nursing home workers who were sick without knowing it. But that’s not the same as saying the discharges played no role. “If they didn’t infect other patients directly,” Shivakoti said, “they still could have infected a worker.” Dr. Mark Dworkin, a former Illinois state epidemiologist, said the finding that people don’t transmit the virus after nine days of illness applies in the population at large, but it’s not clear whether that’s true of nursing home residents who may have weaker immune systems and shed the virus longer. He said the state’s report used “overreaching” language. “They really need to own the fact that they made a mistake, that it was never right to send COVID patients into nursing homes and that people died because of it,” said Dr. Michael Wasserman, president of the California Association of Long Term Care Medicine. New York Department of Health spokesman Gary Holmes said the study was intended to “measure the strength of the variables. ... The strongest factor in driving the nursing home infections was through staff infections.” The Cuomo administration report will likely not be the last word. New York’s Legislature plans to hold joint hearings next month, and Republicans in Congress have demanded Cuomo turned over records on the March 25 order and its effects. “Blame-shifting, name-calling and half-baked data manipulations will not make the facts or the questions they raise go away,” Louisiana U.S Rep. Steve Scalise, Republican leader of a House subcommittee on the COVID crisis, wrote in a letter to Cuomo last week. Asked to respond, Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi said: “We’re used to Republicans denying science but now they are screeching about time, space and dates on a calendar to distract from the federal government’s many, many, embarrassing failures. No one is buying it.”
Gov. Cuomo pummeled online for selling poster touting New York's COVID response Cuomo debuted a poster he designed called "New York Tough" https://www.foxnews.com/politics/go...lling-poster-touting-new-yorks-covid-response Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo is facing intense backlash for selling a poster touting New York's response to the coronavirus outbreak. On Monday, Cuomo debuted a poster he designed called "New York Tough" that he suggests captures the journey his state went through while addressing the pandemic. "I love history. I love poster art. Poster art is something they did in the early 1900s, late 1800s, when they had to communicate their whole platform on one piece of paper," Cuomo stated. "Over the past few years I’ve done my own posters that capture that feeling. I did a new one for what we went through with COVID and I think the general shape is familiar to you. We went up the mountain, we curved the mountain, we came down the other side and these are little telltale signs that, to me, represent what was going on." The poster depicts a mountain with essential workers pulling a rope symbolizing the "flattening of the curve." On top of the poster reads a quote attributed to the governor, "Wake up America! Forget the politics, get smart!" The poster features an airplane with "Europeans," "COVID-19," "Jan-Mar," and "3 million" on it, suggesting that the virus mostly came from Europe instead of China, where the disease is believed to have originated. Also seen on the poster are masks, social distancing, and President Trump sitting on a crescent moon saying, "It's just the flu." According to the pre-order page, the poster costs $14.50 plus shipping and handling and that "New York State does not profit from the sale of this poster." Cuomo's poster was blasted on social media. "He's actually selling his self-congratulatory poster that's centered around a visual representation of 32,000 deaths," Tablet Magazine associated editor Noah Baum reacted. "Was Cuomo always this repugnant or does this much media flattery make anyone lose perspective?" "Your inaction and infighting with the Mayor caused thousands of deaths," activist and former Sanders surrogate Shaun King told Cuomo. "Nearly every expert in the nation says had you acted sooner it could’ve saved nearly 10,000 lives. That you think it’s time for posters touting your 'success' is troubling." "The narcissism and gall is stunning," journalist Jeryl Bier tweeted. Through much of the coronavirus crisis, there has been growing scrutiny over the Democratic governor's order in late March that forced nursing homes to accept patients who tested positive for coronavirus, despite testing deficiencies for both residents and staff. Cuomo signed an executive order on May 11 reversing the policy, stopping hospitals from sending infected patients back to nursing homes and ramping up testing for staff. The Associated Press reported last week that “New York hospitals released more than 6,300 recovering coronavirus patients into nursing homes during the height” of the coronavirus pandemic under a “controversial, now-scrapped policy.”