When he hasn't been busy touting his book on self-proclaimed exemplary leadership during a global pandemic, accepting an Emmy for his smug, self-righteous press conferences or yukking it up with his little brother on the latter's CNN prime time show, Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) regularly deflects blame for his state's ineptitude with anything related to COVID-19.
Perhaps the most egregious affront was Cuomo's policy early on in the pandemic which entailed placing COVID infected patients in nursing homes due to a lack of hospital beds. This was a disaster waiting to happen given we had known from the outset that the elderly as well as those with underlying health conditions were most susceptible to the virus. Sure enough the death toll in NY long-term care facilities was out of control, though it was always suspected that the Cuomo administration was even understating the numbers in the first place.
Sadly, that has now been confirmed.
A damning attorney general’s report that showed Gov. Andrew Cuomo and other officials downplayed the deadly impact of COVID-19 on New York’s nursing homes finally led the state’s embattled health commissioner on Thursday to reveal the total number of resident fatalities.
In a defensive, nearly 1,700-word statement, Dr. Howard Zucker released figures that put the tally of confirmed and presumed deaths in both nursing homes and hospitals at 12,743 as of Jan. 19.
The staggering number is only slightly less than the 13,000-plus suggested by the report issued earlier in the day by Attorney General Letitia James.
That report said data from 62 nursing homes showed the death toll of residents was 56 percent higher than publicly acknowledged by by the Department of Health.
As usual, Cuomo responded with the obligatory defiance.
Cuomo on nursing home deaths: “Who cares [where they died]? They died!” pic.twitter.com/VECpQNKF2I
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) January 29, 2021
Fox News personality Janice Dean, who lost both her husband's parents in New York nursing homes, has been on a months long crusade to hold Cuomo accountable. While Dean acknowledges there is a lot of work remaining in blowing the lid of this scandal, she couldn't help but take a well-deserved victory lap.
Gov. Cuomo said this week in an interview on one of the channels that never asked him questions about the nursing-home tragedy:
“Incompetent government kills people. More people died than needed to die in COVID. That’s the truth.”
Turns out he was talking about himself.
Now that the ego-maniacal Cuomo will ever acknowledge it.
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