Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo passed the buck on the nursing home tragedy Wednesday, saying nursing homes should have ignored his order and refused to take elderly patients infected with the coronavirus.
“The obligation is on the nursing home to say, ‘I can’t take a COVID-positive person. I’m too crowded. I’m too busy. I don’t have enough PPE.’ Whatever the answer is; it doesn’t even matter. If they say, ‘I can’t take the person,’ they can’t take the person. So … that’s how it works.”
But it was Cuomo’s order that forced state nursing homes to take in 4,500 patients with COVID-19, the Associated Press reported. (RELATED: Chris Cuomo Has Yet To Ask Andrew Cuomo About New York Nursing Home Deaths. Here Are 9 Questions He Asked Instead)
Cuomo issued the order to nursing homes and other assisted living centers on March 25, according to AP. He did not reverse that policy until May 11. A Daily Caller News Foundation investigation also discovered that New York undercounted the number of deaths in nursing homes.
The governor has also blamed President Donald Trump for the nursing home catastrophe, suggesting he was following federal government guidelines on where to send nursing home residents infected with the virus. (RELATED: Andrew Cuomo Says He’s Through With Coronavirus Predictions)
FILE PHOTO: New York Governor Andrew Cuomo holds his daily briefing at New York Medical College during the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Valhalla, New York, U.S., May 7, 2020. REUTERS/Mike Segar/File Photo
Fox senior meteorologist Janice Dean, who lost her mother-in-law and father-in-law to the disease in such a facility, has been outspoken in her demand that Cuomo and other state leaders be held accountable for the lapse in judgement.
“This should be one of the biggest stories of this pandemic of 2020 — 20% of our lost loved ones are from nursing homes,”Dean told Fox News host Tucker Carlson. “And it’s because Governor Cuomo and several other governors, by the way in different states forced COVID-recovering patients into nursing homes.”
Just 12% of New York’s roughly 26,000 coronavirus deaths have occurred in nursing homes, Cuomo claimed. “Whatever we’re doing has worked, on the facts,” he added. On May 18, the governor said nursing homes were a “top priority” in New York’s fight against the coronavirus.