After a COVID-19 outbreak left more than 30 dead at a Massachusetts nursing home, the Justice Department’s civil rights division is investigating whether the facility violated its residents’ rights by failing to provide adequate care during and before the pandemic.
“The federal Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act specifically protects the rights of those confined in state facilities like the Holyoke Soldiers’ Home,” located in Holyoke, said U.S. attorney Andrew Lelling.
“It would be difficult to overstate our obligation to the health and well-being of elderly and disabled military veterans and, by extension, to their families,” Lelling said in a statement.
Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker called for an independent investigation into the Soldiers’ Home. This probe is the first publicly-announced federal investigation of a nursing home since the start of the coronavirus crisis.
