Michael Goodwin: Coronavirus nursing home policy — this Cuomo approach proves tragic
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To make sense of the carnage at New York nursing homes, you don’t need to sprout wings and survey the scene from 30,000 feet. Just keep your BS detector on and connect a few big dots.
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{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Start with the knowledge Albany had for months — that the coronavirus was extra-lethal for the elderly. Study after study showed death rates climbed with age, especially among those with serious, pre-existing health issues. That describes the entire population in most nursing homes.
Then look at the now-infamous March 25 directive from the New York State Department of Health that orders those homes and rehabilitation centers to admit and readmit patients sick with the coronavirus. The devil comes in the first sentence of the fifth paragraph:
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{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}“No resident shall be denied re-admission or admission to the NH solely based on a confirmed or suspected diagnosis of COVID-19.”
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It reads like a legal warning against discrimination — because that’s what it is. The order effectively makes patients contaminated with a highly contagious disease a protected class, akin to the way bias is banned along racial and gender lines.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}The concept is obscene. For the same reason that you don’t strike a match near gasoline, anyone carrying the virus should be banned from nursing homes, not forced on them.
CLICK HERE TO CONTINUE READING MICHAEL GOODWIN'S COLUMN IN THE NEW YORK POST