Bodies left in beds at nursing homes as NYC morgues run out of room

One of the two facilities' administration denies the claims, but staffers maintain that unfortunately, there is no place to move the dead

So many people are dying from COVID-19 at two Brooklyn nursing homes that one of them is running out of room to store bodies.

So many people are dying from COVID-19 at two Brooklyn nursing homes that one of them is running out of room to store bodies.

In the last several weeks, roughly 90 residents in the two nursing home— Chateau at Brooklyn Rehabilitation & Nursing Center in Sheepshead Bay and King David Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation in Gravesend— have died and some workers told The New York Post that their dead bodies are being left on the beds.

READ MORE: NYC creates burial plans for COVID-19 deaths, if morgues are too crowded

“These places don’t have morgues,” an unidentified nurse with Chateau at Brooklyn told the newspaper on Monday. “They were putting them downstairs but now a lot of them are being left in their rooms. What else can you do right now?”

The nurse was outside of the building pulling a roller case and a red biohazard bucket, but told The Post, “It’s so sad to be taking blood from someone and the person in the next bed— next to them— is dead.”

Another Chateau at Brooklyn worker said “just over 40” residents had died there “in the last three weeks.”

King David Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation theGrio.com

King David Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation (courtesy of their website)

“They got several patients in isolation now and they are doing a whole lot of cleaning,” the worker told The Post. The worker added that “it’s worse at my other job. At King David… they’re closing in on 50.”

In response, the Chateau at Brooklyn released a statement that read in part “no patient that passes away has ever been left in his or her bed.”

City Councilman Mark Treyger (D-Brooklyn), whose district lies near the King David Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation, said he’s not sure what’s happening but something’s going on.

Treyger said he has been “getting reports of ambulances coming in and out” of the nursing home yet “no one from the city or state has been able to confirm virus cases but clearly something is going on.”

READ MORE: U.S. coronavirus deaths reach 3,000 mark as crisis escalates

A spokesman for the King David Center’s owner, the Bay Ridge-based Allure Group, confirmed to the New York Times that the nursing home had coronavirus cases, but the spokesman didn’t confirm any deaths. The Crown Heights Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation, another property owned by the Allure Group, reportedly had to create a makeshift morgue to handle more than 15 COVID-19 deaths among its residents because funeral homes are struggling to handle the bodies, The Times added.

The New York Department of Health recently released its total COVID-19 related nursing-home deaths, which totaled 1,064 as of Sunday. In addition to the Chateau at Brooklyn and the King David Center, another 915 nursing-home residents have died of COVID-19 state-wide, according to the DOH.

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