Latest report of virus in veterans homes is a mixed bag
No new cases found in Floresville; facility in El Paso still reeling
A state-run veterans home in Floresville, which has had five residents die from COVID-19-related causes since the pandemic began, reported Thursday that it is free of the coronavirus, with no residents testing positive.
The latest report from the Texas Veterans Land Board, which runs the homes, was a mixed bag, with the virus still bedeviling another home in El Paso.
There, 12 deaths have been recorded, with 33 residents and 10 staffers testing positive. That was a sharp turnaround from midMay, when it had lost one resident.
Elder care facilities in the San Antonio area and across the nation have proved vulnerable to outbreaks because of the age and underlying health conditions of their residents, among other factors, and that has been true of the state veterans homes.
The virus has showed up in several of the land board’s nine facilities, one of them in Amarillo nearly a month ago, when it reported its first case. The stateowned homes, regulated by both the Texas Health and Human Services Commission and the U.S. Department
of Veterans Affairs, provide affordable, long-term medical and personal care in clinical settings for qualified veterans, their spouses and Gold Star parents.
They are nursing homes with 1,437 staff members caring for more than 1,000 people with an annual budget of $100 million. They exist in Amarillo, Big Spring, Bonham, McAllen, Temple and Tyler, as well as El Paso, Houston and Floresville.
Texas has about 1.5 million veterans.
The land board reported Thursday that 30 residents in El Paso’s Ambrosio Guillen Texas State Veterans Home, which has 146 resi
dents, had tested positive with four recovering. Another 10 staffers had been positive, with seven recovering so far.
VLB hired a pandemic adviser to review and advise actions for the home’s operators in hopes of mitigating the spread of the virus. The home also brought in a contractor to disinfect the facility.
The first positive case in the El Paso home was reported May 2. Initial testing for residents there was done two days later, with staff screened from May 7-11. El Paso residents are tested for COVID-19 on a weekly basis.
The first coronavirus case in the Frank Tejeda Texas State Veterans Home in Floresville turned up April 10 and the home was quickly hit hard by the virus. Until the first death in El Paso in mid-May, it had been the only state veterans facility to record a death.
A number of facilities had no cases among residents and staff. One of them is the Richard A. Anderson Texas State Veterans Home in Houston, which opened last year and has 26 residents.
Residents and staff at all the facilities have been tested and screening continues.