Connecticut to unveil results of inquiry into virus-hit nursing homes

WILTON, CONN: Connecticut on Tuesday will release the results of an independent review of its early approach to nursing homes ravaged by the coronavirus pandemic, tackling the source of most of its deaths and the main blight on its COVID-19 response.

The review comes as Connecticut and other northeastern states like New York appear to have gained control over the virus, with infection rates among the lowest in the country and below thresholds for opening of schools.

But these states - the hardest hit early in the pandemic - are still coming to terms with their failure to prevent the virus from infiltrating nursing homes and other assisted living facilities in February, March and April, and are looking to create a playbook for a potential second wave in the fall.

The inquiry could also hold lessons for sunbelt states which have seen a surge in nursing home cases in recent weeks. Unique in some ways, Connecticut's experience could prove especially instructive. It adopted a novel approach to keeping discharged COVID-19 hospital patients from re-entering nursing homes and ousted its health commissioner in May, exposing bureaucratic infighting that may have hindered its response.

Connecticut has the fourth highest per-capita coronavirus death rate for nursing homes, after Rhode Island, New Jersey and Massachusetts all northeastern states, according to data from the US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. But the death toll has in recent weeks slowed to a trickle, helped by nearly 2,000 onsite inspections and expansive testing of staff, Deidre Gifford, the state's acting health commissioner, told Reuters. She also believes a move in April to set up facilities to exclusively take in discharged COVID-19 patients helped prevent re-introducing the virus in nursing homes.