The death toll in New York’s long-term care facilities jumped by another 1,516 this weekend as the Cuomo administration adjusted its reporting on adult-care facilities to include residents who died after being transferred to hospitals.

The newly disclosed deaths represented an almost eight-fold increase for assisted living and other adult-care facilities, which provide non-medical services for their elderly and disabled residents.

When combined with the recently revealed count of nursing home residents who died in hospitals, the publicly reported toll in New York’s long-term care facilities had increased by almost 5,800, or 63 percent, over the past 10 days (see table).

The Cuomo administration stresses that its new accounting of long-term care residents who died in hospitals does not represent a change in the state’s overall death toll.

Source: New York State Department of Health

The Health Department’s data on long-term care deaths had previously omitted residents who were sent to hospitals before passing away, a practice used by no other state. Officials had refused to share the full count in spite of months of queries from legislators and the media and a Freedom of Information lawsuit by the Empire Center. 

The department has recently begun disclosing those numbers in response to a critical report from the attorney general’s office and a court ruling in favor of Empire Center’s suit.

The additional data posted this weekend—broken into separate reports for assisted living facilities and other adult-care facilities—give a fuller picture of the pandemic’s overall impact, but fall far short of what the court ordered the department to release.

The Empire Center requested death counts for each day and in each facility, as the state has been collecting them throughout the pandemic. Among other things, these numbers would allow a closer analysis of the impact of the Health Department’s March 25 policy memo compelling nursing homes to admit coronavirus-positive patients.

So far, the department has provided only cumulative totals for each facility.

About the Author

Bill Hammond

As the Empire Center’s senior fellow for health policy, Bill Hammond tracks fast-moving developments in New York’s massive health care industry, with a focus on how decisions made in Albany and Washington affect the well-being of patients, providers, taxpayers and the state’s economy.

Read more by Bill Hammond

You may also like

Emails Confirm That Cuomo’s Staff Launched Its ‘Book’ Project in March 2020

A pair of state-employed writers began researching, outlining and drafting a book about Governor Andrew Cuomo's pandemic response in late March 2020, weeks before New York's harrowing first wave had passed, according to newly disclosed email records. Read More

A Politically Active Medical Group Gains Access to Funds for ‘Distressed’ Providers

A politically connected medical group in the Bronx garnered an unusual benefit in the new state budget – access to money previously reserved for financially troubled safety-net hospitals and nursing homes. Read More

Budget deal increases state-share Medicaid spending by 13 percent

(This post has been updated to correct errors.) Albany's newly enacted budget appears to increase the state share of Medicaid spending by $4.2 billion or 13 percent, contin Read More

The Health Department Releases a Fuller Accounting of COVID’s Deadly First Year

The state Health Department has belatedly published a more complete COVID death count for the pandemic's first year, accounting for more than 6,000 victims who were left out of the state's previous tallies because they died Read More

Hochul’s ‘Pay and Resolve’ Push for Hospitals Triggers Déjà Vu

Two years ago last week, I wrote in the Daily News about how then-Governor Andrew Cuomo was pushing a costly change to insurance law on behalf of a hospital group that had supported his campaign through a fund-rai Read More

While pleading for money in Albany, hospitals and nursing homes spend at the bargaining table

Friday's announcement of an amended labor contract for New York City-area hospitals and nursing homes sends a contradictory message about the financial condition of the state's health-care industry. Read More

The Hochul administration seeks more federal money for its overfunded Essential Plan

In a move that ought to raise eyebrows in Washington, the Hochul administration is requesting additional federal money for New York's Essential Plan, which is already sitting on more than $9 billion after years of running a multi-billion-dollar surplus. Read More

Emails show Cuomo’s staff working on his memoir at the peak of New York’s pandemic

Newly available records shed further light on the origins of former Gov. Andrew Cuomo's pandemic memoir, which won him a $5.1 million publishing contract before contributing to his political downfall. The records reveal that his government staff were a Read More

Empire Center Logo Enjoying our work? Sign up for email alerts on our latest news and research.
Together, we can make New York a better place to live and work!