The Covid-19 pandemic has taught us that the world needs more healthcare professionals at the moment. The scarcity of the same can even cost the world its stability. But, with how unprepared US was in handling the pandemic, and hence a mortality rate of over 0.1 million, the same includes over 25,000 nursing students too.
Not just that, over 60,000 residents were infected with the virus while trying to save people’s lives. The same infected the facilities more which has a history of low marks of staffing along with patient care.
According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services report, the virus also infected over 34,000 staff and killed 400 out of them. The numbers current represent the first official national accounting of the fatalities in the 15,000 nursing homes that are scattered across the country.
The tally is still incomplete at the moment. The report that came out includes 80% of the nursing homes that were asked to report their data to the federal government and that too just the ones that were reported since May.
CMS officials despite that reported that they are confident that the figures still offer a better outlook of the pandemic and how badly it has affected that nursing homes across the country.
“This represents a good picture of where we’ve been,” said CMS Administrator Seema Verma.
But, a Washington Post that accounts for the cases on the similar ground of suspect showcase a higher tally and rounds up from half the states across the country. According to the reports from the Post accumulated from 21 states, they found that over 28,000 residents have died.
The homes that reported their data to CMS had at least one death from Covid-19 when accounting for 1 in 5 nursing homes. Reports also suggest that at least 1 in 4 test positive for the virus. In three of the states of New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts, 1 in every 10 resident died because of Covid-19, as per the reports.
According to the early analysis conducted by CMS, it reported that the nursing homes that have received poor marks for the staffing were the ones that witnessed a higher rate of infection and deaths in comparison to the other ones.
Several of the statistical analyses and studies have found that the outbreaks aren’t dependent on the quality of the nursing homes. Instead, they are dependent on the home’s location and the size instead.
“Significant research from leading health experts, including analysis from Harvard medical school and Brown University as well as testimony to Congress by the University of Chicago, has shown no correlation between covid-19 outbreak and [Medicare’s] star rating system,” said Beth Martino, American Health Care Association senior vice president of public affairs.
Martino further clarified this stating that the first Covid-19 case reported was at a five star rated clinical facility. According to the research, the degree of the Covid-19 cases is directly dependent on the level of virus in the surrounding community.
Verma further reported that their current focus at the moment is on the infection control. They are working on strengthening the enforcements including civil penalties and several other subjective prospects involved.
“This would help prevent backsliding, improve accountability and ensure prompt compliance,” said CMS.
The nursing homes across the country have consistently struggled with infection control both before and during the pandemic. Even a conducted analysis in April found that 650 homes with the coronavirus cases witnessed that 40% had cited for the infection more than once in the recent years.
Verma further reiterated that they are planning on giving away $80 million to each of the states to further work on increasing their infection control inspections of the nursing homes during such testing times. It further mentions that the medicare facilities will have to submit a corrective plan of action by July 31.
The ones that are still lagging by August will end up losing some of the sanctioned money.
This new federal data has come out following consistent pressure from the criticism imposed by the watchdog groups and the patient’s families. They wanted to have a transparency to the data presented to them and that is exactly what they demanded.
Ever since the first outbreak of the coronavirus that happened back in February in Washington, the States have been very aloof in declaring to name some of the affected facilities or even describe the state of the problems around, further forcing the families to plead for information from the specific homes that were not authorised or reluctant to share the details involved.
“I think people have a right to know what’s going on – and not all this hiding. If the nursing homes would just tell the truth, people would respect them a lot more than this language about ‘We love our residents,'” said Toby Edelman, a senior policy attorney at the nonprofit Center for Medicare Advocacy.
It was later in April that the CMS made it mandatory for all the nursing homes to report every case to the Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention on a weekly basis. The final data was requested by CMS by May 17 but the organisation even offered a grace period of two weeks to settle in the cases.
Mark Parkinson, president of the American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living further emphasised on the acquired data saying that these figures are enough for a reason why it is necessary to conduct widespread testing and provide with more support to the nursing homes.
“Especially as we continue to expand testing for residents and staff in long term care centers in June, we should anticipate the number of cases to rise as asymptomatic residents and staff will be identified,” said Parkinson.
He believes that the testing will likely bring in an ugly figure and a very drastic impact on things but the same will also help provide with a bigger picture and allow everyone to take on the threat with preparation.
The data that has been released by CMS doesn’t contain the infected cases or the death counts for individual facilities. They are likely going to be released by Thursday.
