“The health and safety of our residents and staff is our utmost priority and responsibility. Ownership and administration is working around the clock to ensure we are able to resolve the pandemic in the facility.”
Last week New Jersey police received an anonymous tip about a body being stored in a shed in one of the state’s largest nursing homes.
The police arrived at the nursing home but didn’t find a body there. However, they were faced with a gruesome sight in the nursing home’s morgue. In the small morgue built to fit four bodies, they found seventeen.
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“They were just overwhelmed by the amount of people who were expiring,” Eric C. Danielson, the town’s chief of police told The New York Times.
Apparently, the Andover Subacute and Rehabilitation centres have been severely affected by the novel coronavirus with 68 people associated with them having died lately, 26 of which had tested positive for COVID-19, among which two staff members.
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According to the authorities, over the weekend the nursing home had requested 25 body bags. Rep. Josh Gottheimer told the local news that he had recently been contacted by an administrator at the nursing home, who was requesting more body bags. As Gottheimer added, the woman who called was sick herself.
“She called and said, ‘We’re overwhelmed here,’” the congressman told NBC News, adding that there were “so many” staff members sick, too.
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Nursing home co-owner, Chaim Scheinbaum, praised in a statement the effort the staff of the home is making in order to keep the residents and staff safe from the virus.
Part of his statement was the following:
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Meanwhile, the case has caused the outrage of New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, who expressed his frustration about the way the bodies of the deceased were treated by the nursing home staff.
“I am also outraged that bodies of the dead were allowed to pile up in a makeshift morgue at the facility,” he said, adding “we can and must do better.”
According to Gov. Murphy, the attorney general’s office will be investigating the incident in the nursing home in question, as well as similar cases of unusually high death rates in other nursing homes.
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Unfortunately, nursing homes in New Jersey have been hit hard by the novel coronavirus, with 90% of the 375 centers having a confirmed case. All this, considering that the virus can be deadly for the elderly- and not only them of course- makes the situation even more concerning and alarming.
In New York, there have been at least 2,477 nursing home deaths so far, which accounts for 20% of the state’s entire death total.
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According to a recent nationwide tally by The New York Times, the number of people living in nursing homes or are associated with them, who have died of the coronavirus is at least 7,000- much higher than previously reported. This could imply improper application of safety and prevention measures on the part of staff and residents.
In any case, people should be reminded that health and safety go first, follow the official guidelines regarding the prevention of infection and just hope for the best. Let’s wish that there will be no more incidents like the one in the New Jersey home.
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By Irene Markianou
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Irene Markianou is a contributor at SBLY Media.