Cuomo’s Covid policies for disabled group homes face scrutiny
Updated Mar 16, 2021;
By Edward McKinley | Times Union, Albany
Albany, N.Y. At the urging of his Republican colleagues, state Sen. James Skoufis who chairs the chamber’s investigations committee said he is interested in examining Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s Covid-19 policies at group home facilities for people with developmental disabilities, which have mirrored those of nursing homes.
Skoufis said he had discussed the issue on a call Sunday night with Sen. Mike Martucci, the top Republican on the disabilities committee. Senate Republicans followed up with a letter Monday, signed by four members, asking Skoufis to initiate an investigation of the matter.
Cuomo administration is ordering homes for disabled to accept COVID patients | 11 March 2021 | It wasn't just nursing homes. The Cuomo administration has spent the last year quietly allowing COVID-19 patients to return to homes for the disabled much like it did with nursing homes and the policy remains in effect.
AP Photo/Seth Wenig, Pool
Hopefully, most Americans are now aware of the Andrew Cuomo nursing home scandal, that Cuomo ordered nursing homes to take Wuhan coronavirus positive patients whether they wanted to or not. There’s now an investigation underway because of the subsequent cover-up of the number of deaths, which people now believe to be about 15,000 after the order on March 25, 2020.
But that wasn’t the only place he ordered to accept coronavirus patients.
Cuomo ordered homes for the developmentally disabled to accept virus patients and never reversed the order, as he did the nursing home order. The April 10th order was similar to the nursing home order: that they could not require hospitalized residents to be tested for the virus prior to admission or readmission.
COVID cases in New York group homes under scrutiny after nursing home controversy By Michael Roppolo Developmental disabilities raise COVID concerns
In the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo s administration issued a memo instructing hospitals and group homes to expedite the release of asymptomatic group home residents back to their communal living sites. The order may have had terrible consequences. State data obtained by CBS News shows the virus ravaged group homes in the state, infecting more than 20%, or one in five, of their residents.
More than 34,500 people with intellectual and developmental disabilities live in group homes in New York, and there have been 552 COVID-19 deaths reported as of March 7, with 6,934 residents testing positive since 2020, according to the data provided by the state s Office for People with Developmental Disabilities, the agency that oversees support services and group homes.
DiNapoli faults agency s compliance with Jonathan s Law
FacebookTwitterEmail 3
1of3Buy PhotoComptroller Tom DiNapoli is interviewed on Tuesday, Jan 9, 2018, at Hearst Media Center in Colonie, N.Y. (Skip Dickstein/ Times Union)SKIP DICKSTEINShow MoreShow Less
2of3Times Union Staff Photograph by Philip Kamrass Michael and Lisa Carey wait outside of the Schenectady County District Attorney s office to meet with him about trying to get him to file charges against state officials about the treatment of their son Jonathan, who was autistic, in Schenectady, NY on Tuesday November 27, 2007(for his treatment prior to the incident that caused his death). Jonathan died while under the care of state workers in 2007. Michael holds pictures (that the Careys made) of a bruised and injured Jonathan from December 2005. Through the release of Jonathan s state records due to the passage of Jonathan s Law, the Careys learned that their son was being taken care of by Edwin Tirado on th