New York accused of covering up nursing home deaths

Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s administration for months delayed the public release of data about the COVID-19 death toll among nursing home residents. A partial transcript of a Wednesday meeting of Democratic lawmakers included Melissa DeRosa, a Cuomo aide, saying the administration “froze” over worries the information was “going to be used against us.” Republicans called the comments admission of a cover-up and demanded DeRosa and Cuomo resign. Progressive Democrats are also saying the administration wasn’t transparent enough.

How many deaths were there? On March 25, Cuomo prohibited nursing homes from refusing people because they had the virus. On May 3, the state began only releasing the number of deaths that actually took place in nursing homes without counting residents who were taken to hospitals before they died. On May 10, Cuomo reversed his nursing home order following accusations it was causing new outbreaks. In the past few weeks, the state has revised the official number of nursing home coronavirus deaths from 8,500 to nearly 15,000. And the Associated Press obtained new records saying New York sent more than 9,000 recovering COVID-19 patients to hundreds of nursing homes—more than 40 percent more than the state health department previously reported.

Dig deeper: Read our Saturday Series featuring a ProPublica report on Cuomo’s decision to admit COVID-19 patients to nursing homes.