ALBANY — Andrew Cuomo was dishonest about nursing house deaths. A brand new audit from state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli makes that clear.
The previous governor’s Well being Division, the 58-page report notes, “was not clear in its reporting of COVID-19 deaths at nursing properties,” later including that as an alternative of “offering correct and dependable info throughout a public well being emergency, the division as an alternative conformed its presentation to the chief’s narrative.”
However we knew that already, proper?
A prior report by Legal professional Basic Tish James, together with in depth reporting by this newspaper and others, confirmed that Cuomo undercounted nursing house deaths to deflect criticism from a controversial state order that pressured the services to just accept COVID-19 sufferers. Politics trumped the reality.
It was shameful conduct — a shame that should not be forgotten in gentle of the sexual harassment scandal that led Cuomo to resign. I imply, what sort of individual misleads the general public on deaths amongst weak New Yorkers?
The DiNapoli audit, launched Tuesday, is an in depth reminder of the terrible conduct and one other rebuttal to Group Cuomo claims that the previous governor was undone by political subterfuge. Learn the report and the true causes for Cuomo’s downfall turn out to be clear.
However the audit is greater than only a reminder of an outdated scandal. It breaks floor in highlighting how New York was poorly ready for the pandemic, particularly in regard to nursing properties, and the way badly the state responded when COVID-19 arrived.
Amongst different findings, the report particulars poor Heath Division oversight of nursing house circumstances and finds that strains of coordination with native well being officers had been typically damaged. It additionally discovered that New York considerably trailed different states in growing methods to maintain the virus out of nursing properties.
The report additionally says this: “The division was affected by a threatening setting of intimidation, closed ranks, and lack of dedication to openness — on the expense of the general public’s belief.”
The audit would not simply spotlight the Cuomo administration’s dishonesty, then. It exhibits its incompetence.
The timing for the previous governor is awful, provided that he solely lately launched a return to public life. In actual fact, a brand new Cuomo advert makes an attempt to painting the Democrat as an efficient commander who “led this nation by means of the horrifying COVID-19 disaster.”
The DiNapoli audit renders that already laughable declare ludicrous, which helps clarify why a Cuomo spokesman was fast to assault the report as motivated by politics. As at all times, you see, our former governor is the sufferer, the poor fellow.
Gosh darn, why is everybody so imply to him? The person solely needs to unfold kindness and love!
Please. Cuomo was the bully, not the sufferer. And whereas Group Cuomo can maybe purpose the “politically motivated” dart at James — she did, in any case, announce her short-lived gubernatorial candidacy after his resignation — DiNapoli has hardly proven starvation for greater workplace throughout 15 years on the job.
” my repute for being a killer political animal,” DiNapoli joked on Wednesday. “There are quite a lot of issues you may lay at my doorstep, however utilizing audits for political functions is not one in every of them.”
DiNapoli, noting that his workplace has repeatedly examined points impacting nursing properties, described the audit as a name to motion, of types, that illustrates weaknesses the state should handle earlier than the subsequent well being disaster. Nursing properties residents, in different phrases, ought to by no means once more be left so uncovered.
“Now we have to acknowledge that with nursing properties, we’re coping with a inhabitants that’s amongst our most weak,” DiNapoli informed me. “It is such a giant concern. So many lives had been misplaced, and there was such a lack of religion in how the federal government dealt with it.”
Within the wake of the comptroller’s audit, a lot of the eye will likely be on Cuomo, and never with out cause. As its findings clarify, New Yorkers would have been higher off had the previous governor targeted extra on disaster administration and fewer on picture upkeep and, um, sketchy e book offers.
Cuomo is out of energy now and is more likely to keep that approach, regardless of no matter comeback he hopes to foist upon the general public. However tens of hundreds of New Yorkers stay in nursing properties, and, because the audit notes, the state’s insufficient oversight of the services and low compliance requirements are outdated, unresolved issues.
That must be its prime takeaway, at the same time as we’re reminded of a previous scandal.
“There was an undercount of nursing house deaths,” DiNapoli mentioned, “and the general public was not given the straight story.”
cchurchill@timesunion.com ■ 518-454-5442 ■ @chris_churchill