Below is the weekly update on the Washington Congressional Delegation Call 

Federal Coronavirus Commission for Safety and Quality in Nursing Homes

We reported the multiple concerns we have with the commission and their objective. Overall the concerns are the commission is going to take a punitive approach in working with skilled nursing facilities. We need to ensure the right people are on the commission who can represent providers. We have concerns with the following two objectives.

• Strengthen regulations to enable rapid and effective identification and mitigation of COVID-19 transmission in nursing homes.

Increasing regulations is not going to be effective unless you increase test availability and PPE supply. 

• Enhance federal and state enforcement strategies to improve compliance with infection control policies in response to COVID-19.

We would encourage CMS to adopt a collaborative effort with SNFs to adhere to infection control policies in response to COVID-19 instead of enforcement actions. We don’t know enough about this virus to say it is a failed infection control practice. Until there is adequate PPE and testing readily available, we cannot gauge where improvements can be made or what a helpful response would be. 

Liability

We are continuing to ask for federal and state limited liability protections on behalf of licensed organizations and the professionals that deliver care to individuals.  We continue to await the Governor’s response on our state request for protection but we’ve been told it’s unlikely to be granted.  Should the Governor deny our request, we will continue to push for this important protection in the Legislature whenever they return for a Special Session.  While many other industries are also now asking for these federal protections as the country opens up, it’s critically important in our Long Term Care settings as we cannot close our doors and have been working without adequate PPE and testing supplies to effectively manage against the spread of this virus with both residents and staff falling ill and some dying.

FEMA PPE

The health care industry, particularly LTC continues to operate without PPE, testing, putting workers, and providers at risk

It has been confirmed that the FEMA distribution of PPE to skilled nursing facilities is for Medicaid and/or Medicare contracted facilities only. LeadingAge has advocated there are private pay SNFs that will be left out of this distribution and they need to be included. We also need PPE to be delivered to assisted living and other HCBS to protect all older Washingtonians and their caregivers. 

Questions?

Contact:

Alyssa Odegaard- Vice President, Public Policy 

c: 206.948.2279