Police investigate case of abandoned senior
No charges laid after probe; four COVID-19 outbreaks in city declared over
Four COVID-19 outbreaks are over in Hamilton, but the only remaining resident of Rosslyn Retirement Residence to test negative for the virus is now positive.
Hamilton public health says outbreaks are over at Grace Villa on the east Mountain, where two staff tested positive; Idlewyld Manor on Sanatorium Road, where one resident tested positive; Dundurn Place Care Centre on Mary Street, where 12 residents and three staff tested positive and two residents died; and Wentworth Lodge in Dundas, which was in “outbreak” as a result of false positives.
Public health waited until all Wentworth Lodge staff results were received before declaring that the outbreak was officially over.
At Rosslyn Retirement Residence, site of an unprecedented COVID-19 outbreak which involved a staffing shortage so severe the entire home had to be evacuated last Friday, all residents are now COVID-positive.
Public health initially said 63 of the 64 residents had tested positive. One tested negative. But on Thursday, they confirmed all 64 are now positive.
“One patient retested positive from negative,” said Kelly Anderson, public health spokesperson.
Meanwhile, Hamilton police say they conducted an investigation involving the home.
Jackie Penman, police spokesperson, said officers investigated an incident in which a senior was mistakenly left alone in the evacuated retirement home for 18 hours. All residents in the home were meant to be transferred to hospital, though two made their own alternative ar
rangements.
“The incident was investigated by our uniform patrol and reviewed by our ‘crimes against seniors’ unit,” Penman said. “Based on information we received from the hospital at the time of admission, criminal charges are not warranted at this time.”
No one made a formal complaint, she said.
An executive with St. Joseph’s Healthcare, one of the hospitals involved in the evacuation, apologized for the incident. Another with Hamilton Health Sciences called the mistake “shocking,” but added the home’s operator also shares responsibility.
There was no master list of who lived in the home, said Winnie Doyle, executive vicepresident of clinical operations at St. Joseph’s Healthcare.
No one from Rosslyn Retirement Residence has responded to requests from The Spectator for comment.
A debriefing on the how the resident was missed was scheduled for Thursday.
“We can say the situation underscores the difficulty of going into a congregate setting where staffing has become an issue, and there are no staff available who know the residents or are familiar with the complete layout of the home,” said Elaine Mitropoulos, spokesperson for St. Joe’s. “Learnings from this suggest a necessity for congregate settings to have available a current master list of all residents, and a system set up to easily identify each resident to match against that list.”
Mitropoulos said it is also important for homes to have early infection prevention control measures in place and “ideally have some staff available who are familiar with the home and its residents.”
Doyle has described a chaotic situation during the nearly nine-hour evacuation. No Rosslyn staff were remaining at the home, largely due to 20 being infected with the virus.
Meanwhile, the premier gave Hamilton two shout-outs during a provincial briefing on Thursday.
Premier Doug Ford said two Hamilton-based COVID-19 research proposals — one from St. Joseph’s Healthcare and one McMaster University — are among 15 the province is funding through its COVID-19 Rapid Research Fund.
“Any of these are groundbreaking projects,” Ford said, adding, “I want that vaccine to be discovered right here in Ontario.”
The St. Joe’s proposal is relating to rapid testing method that could see labs process 6,000 tests a day. Ontario is currently able to process 20,000 tests a day.
The McMaster proposal is focused on a study of antibodies in recovered COVID patients.