Media Tip Sheets

Nursing Homes and The Pandemic — Legal Expert Weighs In

Tuesday, September 10, 2024, By Ellen Mbuqe
On Tuesday, Sept. 10, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo will testify publicly before the House of Representative’s select subcommittee on the coronavirus pandemic.
Cuomo’s administration has faced significant criticism for how it handled nursing home residents who contracted COVID-19 in the early months of the pandemic. New York mandated in March 2020 that nursing homes must admit patients who tested positive for COVID.
For reporter’s covering the hearing and need an expert, please consider Nina Kohn, professor of law at Syracuse University College of Law, and an expert in elder law and civil rights of the elderly. To give you a sense of her perspective, here are the comments she shared:
  • “Former Governor Cuomo has been much criticized for directing nursing homes to accept COVID-19 positive patients. While, especially in retrospect this was a bad policy decision, it is unclear to what extent it had an impact on resident deaths. The reality is many facilities would have accepted these individuals without a mandate because it was financially advantageous to do so,” said Kohn.

 

  • “Nevertheless, the direction signaled a lack of concern for the fate of nursing home residents—which was made even more evident by the breathtaking immunity the Governor supported for nursing homes and their owners. Under Cuomo’s leadership, nursing homes and their corporate owners were granted immunity from liability for harm to residents amid the pandemic. While many states provided some immunity for healthcare providers at the height of the pandemic, none were more expansive than New York. Indeed, New York’s measure was so extreme that it even limited the ability of the state’s Attorney General to hold institutions and executives liable for false or fraudulent claims, or from prosecuting certain acts that could otherwise result in criminal charges,” said Kohn.
Kohn is a well-known expert on issues around nursing homes and has been quoted in numerous articles. She has written several scholarly articles about COVID and nursing homes including:
To schedule an interview, please contact Ellen James Mbuqe, executive director of media relations, at ejmbuqe@syr.edu.