NYS Supreme Court Says DOH Must Provide Complete Nursing Home Deaths Within Five Days

  New York State Supreme Court Justice Kimberly A. O’Connor ruled that within five days, the New York Department of Health (DOH) must disclose records that reveal the full count of coronavirus deaths among nursing home residents: a request that the DOH has refused and delayed three times.

    The decision came as part of a lawsuit brought against Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the DOH by the Empire Center for Public Policy on behalf of the thousands of families who lost loved ones to COVID-19 in state-regulated nursing homes.

   The ruling of Justice O’Connor, which included a ruling that New York state must pay for the Empire Center’s legal fees, comes less than a week after New York Attorney General Letitia James revealed that Gov. Andrew Cuomo's administration undercounted COVID-19 nursing home deaths by up to 50%, by counting only those patients who died in nursing homes, but not those who died after being sent to hospitals.

   The Office of the Attorney General, however, argued that nursing home residents should be counted as the state’s “COVID nursing home deaths” whether they died in nursing homes in hospitals: a point New York State Health Commissioner Howard Zucker, MD, has tried to obfuscate and deny.

   In September 2020, New York state Sen. Jim Tedisco (R) filed with the Empire Center for Public Policy, an amicus brief, which is non-partial information, that explained information about the grieving families’ request for accurate data.

    “Clearly the best disinfectant is sunlight,” said Sen. Tedisco. “Governor Cuomo’s coronavirus cover-up is crumbling down. Last week, the Attorney General issued a scathing report that has begun to lift the Cuomo Administration’s veil of secrecy that was hiding the real number of nursing home residents who died from COVID-19.”