LeDuff: Clueless -- Michigan Doesn't Know True Nursing Home Death Toll From Covid
A joint investigation by the "No BS News Hour" and the Mackinac Center for Public Policy reveals that the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) does not do a thorough job of scrubbing vital records to determine whether people who died of Covid were nursing home residents, as its own guidelines require.
Moreover, our investigation found that DHHS did conduct a limited review of those vital records last summer, and found that 44 percent could be traced to nursing homes.
Don't expect the nursing home data to get better or more accurate. DHHS has abandoned the practice of thoroughly scrubbing records because it is considered too “time-consuming.”
Why should it matter? Because we need a clear picture of what happened to our elderly during the pandemic so we can do better next time. Data helps. Unfortunately, it's unclear if even the incomplete and limited numbers have ever been made public.
The true number of pandemic deaths inside Michigan's elder care centers may never be known. But our analysis shows that the Covid death toll may be 100 percent higher than the state reports.
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