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#Nursing home audit the final nail in Cuomo’s political coffin

“Nursing home audit the final nail in Cuomo’s political coffin”

Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo is reportedly considering a run against Gov. Kathy Hochul, but a devastating audit Tuesday by state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli should nip that crazy notion in the bud.

Instead of providing model “leadership” in the fight against COVID, as Cuomo continues to pretend he did, DiNapoli says New York’s response at nursing homes was among the worst in the nation.

Plus, the comptroller charges Team Cuomo with politicizing the Department of Health — intentionally misleading the public and suppressing facts in reporting COVID deaths at nursing homes.

DOH “was not transparent,” the audit states bluntly. It “routinely underreported death counts,” by as much as 100%. From April 2020 to February 2021, it failed to account for 4,100 nursing-home lives lost to the virus, falling “far short” of its “moral” responsibilities.

Strong words. Too bad DiNapoli couldn’t find the courage to stand up to Cuomo when he was in office and his findings might’ve made a difference.

DiNapoli says the department’s failures began before the pandemic. “A persistent lack of funding” forced it to “operate without critical information systems.” Yet he also cites intentional misreporting (i.e., lying) that became a serious problem when “the Executive” — Cuomo — “took control of information.” To this day, many families “still don’t have answers.”

Among the audit’s findings:

  • New York “trailed other states in surveying nursing homes and developing strategies to stop infections from spreading.” It surveyed just 20% of facilities between March 23 and May 30, 2020, compared to more than 90% in some other states.
  • “Inadequate support” at DOH led to delays in setting up infectious-disease-control procedures at health facilities.
  • DOH knew one of its key informational systems was not reliable but never corrected the problem, limiting its “ability to respond.”

At the heart of the scandal, of course: Team Cuomo’s order for nursing homes to accept COVID-contagious patients, even though the then-gov himself rightly warned the virus could spread “like fire through dry grass” at such facilities. The delays and lies were meant to hide the resulting deaths.

DiNapoli's audit found that the Department of Health “routinely underreported death counts."
DiNapoli’s audit found that the Department of Health “routinely underreported death counts.”
AP Photo/Seth Wenig

And lest any doubt a coverup, DiNapoli notes that the department “imposed impediments” on his audit and delayed providing requested data (as it did with other watchdogs).

The new findings echo those of other investigators, such as state Attorney General Letitia James and those in the Assembly. But that only highlights how late DiNapoli is to the game.

At least it’s another blow to any Cuomo comeback. The ex-gov brags that he’s escaped criminal charges for all those allegations of sexual abuse. But the scathing reports of his nursing-home fiasco are indictment enough: Andrew Cuomo should never hold any political office again.

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