Editorial: A comprehensive review of high nursing home death toll is needed.

The human toll of the COVID-19 pandemic hit state Rep. Michelle L. Cook personally with the April 2 death of her father-in-law, William Cook. The 90-year-old Mr. Cook had been staying at the Litchfield Woods Nursing Home in Torrington.

Rep. Cook and her husband, Christopher Cook, told the Waterbury Republican-American that they had received conflicting information about Mr. Cook’s condition and inaccurate information about the prevalence of COVID-19 infections in the facility.

Rep. Cook, a Democrat from Torrington and a member of the Public Health Committee, has joined the voices of others in calling for an investigation into the high death count in the state’s nursing homes and whether more could have been done to prevent it.

While the attention at this moment has to be on providing these facilities the help they need to mitigate the tragedy that is occurring within the walls of many, there will be a time when the Public Health Committee should do its oversight job and take a critical, unflinching look at the factors that contributed to the high number of deaths.

COVID-19 deaths in Connecticut number around 3,000, with nearly 60% attributable to nursing home residents. Granted, the advanced age and compromised health conditions make this populace particularly vulnerable. It is not shocking the highly contagious virus, for which humans had no built-up immunity and for which there is yet no vaccine, would tear through institutions in which the susceptible and weak are clustered in relatively close quarters.

Still, reports that personal protective equipment was lacking, that the ranks of those bravely serving these individuals were not supplemented when they dwindled due to acquiring the virus, and that testing could have been more effectively utilized all need to be explored.

In a conversation with The Day on Monday, state Sen. Heather Somers, R-Groton, the ranking member of the Public Health Committee, said the role that a lack of state support provided also must be explored. Medicaid reimbursements were effectively frozen for 15 years, placing great financial strain on many nursing homes, she said. Somers said she fears it left the industry understaffed and underequipped, in other words set up for failure when the crisis hit.

These tragic circumstances have focused on the need for a comprehensive look at our elder-care system, Somers said. She’s right. We look forward to Somers lending her voice to the investigation that should follow.