Nursing home cases up despite efforts

COVID-19 increases four-fold in surge states

WASHINGTON — Despite Trump administration efforts to erect a protective shield around nursing homes, coronavirus cases are surging within facilities in states hard hit by the latest onslaught of COVID-19.

An analysis of federal data from 20 states for The Associated Press finds that new weekly cases among residents rose nearly four-fold from the end of May to late October, from 1,083 to 4,274. Resident deaths more than doubled, from 318 a week to 699, according to the study by University of Chicago health researchers

Rebecca Gorges and Tamara Konetzka.

Equally concerning, weekly cases among nursing home staff in surge states more than quadrupled, from 855 the week ending May 31, to 4,050 the week ending Oct. 25. Infected staffers not yet showing symptoms are seen as the most likely way the virus gets into facilities.

The administration has allocated $5 billion to nursing homes, shipped nearly 14,000 fast-test machines with a goal of supplying every facility and tried to shore up stocks of protective equipment. But the data call into question whether vulnerable people can be cocooned as the virus rebounds around them.

“Trying to protect nursing home residents without controlling community spread is a losing battle,” said

Konetzka, a nationally recognized expert on long-term care. “Someone has to care for vulnerable nursing home residents, and those caregivers move in and out of the nursing home daily, providing an easy pathway for the virus to enter.”

Nursing homes and other longterm care facilities account for about 1 percent of the U.S. population, but represent 40 percent of COVID-19 deaths, according to the COVID Tracking Project.

Responding to the study findings, the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services issued a statement saying the COVID-19 pandemic’s effect on nursing homes is complex.

The agency said its focus now was on ensuring that residents and staff would “immediately” have access to a vaccine once approved.

Richard Tsong-taatarii The Associated Press Carla Gillespie with her son Dylan visits her mother, Evelyn Solberg, at the Jones-harrison Residence in Minneapolis on Oct. 12. It was the first time families have been allowed to visit, while masked up and behind a plastic shield, since March.