A rare thing has been occurring recently, Governor of New York Andrew Cuomo has been working hand-in-hand with President Trump, even praising him for working together with him.

New York has not been prepared for this outbreak, but sadly, Gov. Cuomo could have done much more to combat this but instead chose not to.

Back in 2015, he refused to purchase 16,000 ventilators in case there were a pandemic in the future even though he was recommended to do so.

Instead, what he chose was basically death panels and a lottery instead. There would be a team of triage officers who would play God and decide who gets a ventilator and who would just be left to die. And if former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg had any say in it, we know that he would just let the older people die, just like he said in a video that had resurfaced during his presidential campaign.

After learning that the state’s stockpile of medical equipment had 16,000 fewer ventilators than New Yorkers would need in a severe pandemic, Gov. Andrew Cuomo came to a fork in the road in 2015. He could have chosen to buy more ventilators. Instead, he asked his health commissioner, Howard Zucker to assemble a task force and draft rules for rationing the ventilators they already had.

That task force came up with rules that will be imposed when ventilators run short. Patients assigned a red code will have the highest access, and other patients will be assigned green, yellow or blue (the worst) depending on a “triage officer’s” decision. In truth, a death officer. Let’s not sugarcoat it. It won’t be up to your own doctor.

Cuomo could have purchased the additional 16,000 needed ventilators for $36,000 apiece or a total of $576 million in 2015. It’s a lot of money but less than the $750 million he threw away on a boondoggle “Buffalo Billion” solar panel factory. When it comes to state budget priorities, spending half a percent of the budget on ventilators is a no brainer.

Now the pandemic is actually here. Cuomo’s grim reaper rules will be applied. New York City’s deputy commissioner for disease control Demetre Daskalakis is anticipating “some very serious difficult decisions.” So far, in New York City, 1 out of every 4 people with a confirmed case has been hospitalized, and 44% of them have needed a ventilator.

Sources:
Real Clear Politics