Infection of nursing homes, surge of deaths during blockade measures

Nursing homes nationwide have been blocked for weeks by federal mandate to protect vulnerable elderly from coronavirus, but since then there has been a wave of deadly outbreaks on a daily basis, Measures such as bans and daily medical checks of staff were too late or not strict enough.

Recent outbreaks in Tennessee, New Jersey, Ohio, West Virginia, and Maryland have highlighted the largest gap, with at least 450 deaths from nursing homes in the United States. Screening physicians, nurses, aides, and other workers does not include actual testing, but temperature gain or health questions that allow infected asymptomatic individuals to slip through.

“It’s like Swiss cheese with people still coming in and out, so you’re experiencing these explosions in a senior facility,” said Long Valley, NJ, who recently pulled his 85-year-old mother. John Barros said of a life support center because of fear of infectious diseases.

After 100 infections and four deaths at the Gallatin Rehabilitation and Healing Center on the outskirts of Nashville, Tennessee—the National Guard was called to help evacuate the facility—Sumner County Mayor Anthony Holt said. COVID-19 and “exposed many patients” have blamed staff who have worked despite showing symptoms.

“It’s out of hand,” Holt told The Associated Press. “Once I had symptoms, I just had to go home and contact the Health Department. I don’t think that was the case.”

Following a mass outbreak near Dayton, Ohio, two nursing homes less than 10 miles away killed six people and infected nearly 50, and health officials reported that a respiratory specialist working at multiple facilities a day He began investigating medical professionals such as respiratory therapists. One such medical worker who visited both homes tested positive for COVID-19.

Governor Larry Hogan of Maryland said that the disease had spread like a “ wildfire ” at a nursing home in Mount Airy, killing five people and infecting 77 people, but asymptomatic health workers were reported He seems to have “infected the population” after passing the check screening. “

Some relatives of the Sandale Nursing Home in Morgantown, West Virginia, responded positively to 29 residents and staff, but before the federal regulation was enacted in mid-March, the coronavirus was released. He said more had to be done to stop it.

“The day before the closure, we set foot everywhere. There was no sign in. Courtney Templeton has not stated anything about his last visit to his 69-year-old mother.

Templeton also does not test occupants fast enough and accuses the home of separating healthy people from those who have just returned from a nearby hospital showing COVID-19 symptoms, including their mother’s roommates.

“She coughed and came back and became fevery,” Templeton spoke of the visit two weeks ago, after which she began begging home to protect her mother. “Can you keep the incoming patients separate? Can you keep them quarantined for 14 days?”

Last week, Templeton was notified that both his roommate and her mother were ill.

Although the federal government has not announced its own case numbers, media reports and a count of APs by the state health ministry indicate that at least 450 people have died and nearly 2,000 infections have been reported in nursing homes and nursing homes across the country. Associated with the outbreak of the virus.

Experts also say that for more than 15,000 such facilities in the United States and the 1 million people who live in them, the situation can get worse before the situation gets better.

They say the crisis has only deepened the chronic shortage of nursing homes, as more workers are in self-quarantine or at home with their children. Extensive testing of staff and patients has not been performed, and the lack of masks and other protective equipment continues.

“This is an emergency and is just completely ignored by all national policies,” said Charlene Harrington, a former Secretary of State at the University of California at San Francisco. “They are the most vulnerable people in the country who do not focus on these facts.”

Even worse, some states that are overcrowded in hospitals are trying to force patients recovering from COVID-19 to retirement homes.

New York City last week informed the entire state that it would ban nursing homes from refusing hospitalization “only based on confirmed or suspected COVID-19 diagnoses.” California has told retirement homes to make similar preparations. Massachusetts announces plans to designate certain nursing homes as care centers for COVID-19 patients—a move that sets it apart from other states

“ It is a disaster recipe to send inpatients who are likely to carry the virus to a nursing home that does not have the appropriate units, equipment, and staff to accept COVID-19 patients, ” said Mark H. of the American Health Care Association. Parkinson said.

The Federal Directive on Nursing Home Coronavirus Prevention follows one of the largest outbreaks in the United States, killing 40 people in a life care center nursing home near Seattle. Government inspections found that the infection at home and other places nearby was most likely caused by employees who worked during the illness.

According to a March 13 order from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, nursing homes will immediately suspend visitors and non-essential workers, cancel shared meals and group activities, and provide residents and staff with You should actively test for fever and respiratory symptoms.

However, the order did not mandate regular testing of staff. It states that nursing home providers and advocates are not possible or practical due to the limited availability of tests and the delay in obtaining results.

“In an ideal world, has anyone been screened for the COVID test? Of course, but that’s all we can do,” said Katharine Hill O’Neill, a nursing home consultant and instructor at the University of Pennsylvania.

The restriction does little to delay the daily heartbeat of a new infection.

In New Jersey, the entire nursing home was relocated after 24 homes were confirmed infected and the rest were presumed infected. Seven people died in a nursing home on the outskirts of Richmond, Virginia, and more than 40 people were infected. Two people died in a nursing home east of Los Angeles and at least 57 people were infected. In Long Island, New York, a retirement community has killed eight people so far in two weeks.

“The coronavirus in nursing homes is like a fire on dry grass,” said Governor Andrew Cuomo New York this week.

Indeed, all kinds of infections in nursing homes are chronic problems, killing 380,000 people each year. However, AP reviews of federal inspection records show that some facilities suffering from outbreaks were given a low “star” ranking for overall quality, even before the coronavirus crisis. Three homes in Ohio and Illinois received two out of five stars. The same goes for Gallatin’s home in Tennessee. Last year, inspectors found a cart without guards in the hall, and residents drew ice with bare hands.

Relatives of nursing homes are banned from visiting and literally look outside and communicate with their parents and grandparents through windows and smartphones. Their greatest fear is that their loved ones are left alone.

“If someone loses a loved one, you can’t embrace them,” said 80-year-old Rosan Jordan, a resident of a retirement and nursing home in New Orleans whose husband died at the age of 13 in COVID. Last month-19th.

Even though she was in the same house, Jordan was away from her husband and could only talk to him near the end of FaceTime.

“I would have known that it was the last time I was talking to him,” she said. “I think hearing my voice was a bit of comfort to him.”

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Randy Harshaft, an AP research news researcher, and John Shewer of Toledo, Ohio; Michael Kanselman of College Park, Maryland; and Sarah Rankin of Richmond, contributed to this report.