TRENTON, NJ – Over 43,000 positive COVID-19 cases have been deleted from the state’s official database of COVID-19 since early March. The Murphy administration has identified these cases as duplicates and errors. That accounts for 4% of the state’s COVID-19 case load. Over the past few weeks, there have been more COVID-19 cases deleted from the books than there have been positive cases.
We reported last June that Murphy’s numbers were questionable after a series of anomalies began in the daily COVID-19 counts. Then, Murphy began adding ‘probable deaths’, scientifically unconfirmed deaths to the state’s death count. Now, the Department of Health has been cleaning up a year’s worth of erroneous records and the overall case load has decreased by over 4%. The Murphy administration calls these deletions ‘corrections’.
Related: Is Governor Murphy cooking the COVID-19 books?