New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) is denying that the state is padding its coronavirus death toll.
President Donald Trump said during a press conference on Wednesday that officials in the state were adding deaths to the coronavirus death toll “just in case.”
“I see this morning where New York added 3,000 deaths because they died. And they’re now saying rather than it was a heart attack, they’re saying it was a heart attack caused by this so they’re adding,” Trump said.
He added, “What they are doing is, just in case, they’re calling it this — that’s okay.”
But during a press conference on Thursday, Cuomo denied that was the case, “Why would New York City want to inflate a death toll? I mean, that doesn’t make a lot of sense.”
He continued, “It’s bad enough as it is. It’s painful enough as it is. Why would you want to inflate a death toll?”
Watch the video below:
Cuomo responds to Trump's allegation that New York City is padding its coronavirus death count: "It is bad enough and painful enough as it is. Why would you inflate a death toll? It sounds even more bizarre than usual that anyone would want to do that." https://t.co/9T8aUPjUrs pic.twitter.com/G6S5qrL56R
— CBS News (@CBSNews) April 16, 2020
Cuomo went on to explain that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) updated its reporting requirements for coronavirus deaths.
“The CDC put out guidelines on what numbers you must report. We’ve always said all we really know are deaths in a hospital or deaths in a nursing home. Could people be dying at home because of the coronavirus, and we’re not counting them? Yes. Was this a rough estimate? Yes. So now we’re trying to refine the estimate, other categories, other possibilities. I think that’s what it is more than anything. It’s more of a reporting process.”
Additionally, Cuomo’s spokesperson sought to clarify that the new deaths were part of a new category of “probable deaths.”
And Cuomo questioned whether those numbers were accurate, “I don’t think the city put the numbers together, I think the Times wrote a story that put the numbers together and then said they had a much higher number. I get it’s a great headline, but it’s not totally accurate.”