The Assembly and Senate will examine residential health care facilities and hospitals in August as part of a series of joint hearings on the COVID-19 pandemic.
Two will focus on nursing homes: today’s hearing will look at New York City, Long Island, and Westchester County. A second hearing, on August 10, will focus on Upstate New York. GNYHA’s testimony for the first hearing examines whether the discharge of COVID-19 patients from hospitals to nursing homes contributed to nursing homes’ COVID-19 fatalities and reaches this conclusion: “The claim that nursing home fatalities were caused by admissions from hospitals is not supported by the facts.”
GNYHA believes that multiple factors, independent of admission policies, drove the number of deaths in New York nursing homes.
On August 12, the Legislature will turn its attention to hospitals—specifically, “New York State’s rate of infection and mortality due to COVID-19 in hospitals.” GNYHA plans to testify and will notify you when more details are available.