As COVID-19 ravaged California’s nursing homes, inspectors were not being tested for the virus
LOS ANGELES — Since early in the COVID-19 pandemic, California health officials have required nursing homes to bar entry to outsiders who might bring the coronavirus in with them and trigger a deadly outbreak among the elderly, vulnerable residents.
As a result, aging parents haven’t seen their families in months. Many have died without a final embrace from the people they loved.
But despite requiring routine testing of residents and employees, there’s one group California health officials have knowingly sent from nursing home to nursing home without first testing them for the lethal virus: state inspectors.
Interviews with eight registered nurses working as inspectors for the California Department of Public Health — all of whom spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation — revealed that the department has not provided coronavirus testing for the very people it is sending to make sure facilities comply with rules on infection control.
The inspectors said they are exposed to the virus on an almost daily basis and could easily be spreading the disease. One said she came down with a bad cough and tested positive for COVID-19 soon after visiting more than a dozen nursing homes in two days.
Public health officials said they had sent about 500 inspectors to the state’s roughly 1,200 skilled nursing facilities. Some with the worst outbreaks were visited multiple times. California was inspecting homes at triple the rate of other states, officials said.
“For them to send us in without testing or screening is unconscionable,” said an inspector in Southern California. “I think nursing homes shouldn’t let us in.”
Most of the inspectors interviewed also said they have not been provided with properly fitting personal protective equipment. One inspector said she refuses to spend more than a few minutes in a nursing home’s “red zone,” the quarantine wing reserved for COVIDpositive residents, because every time she exhales wearing her ill-fitting masks, her glasses fog up.
In a brief email response to questions from The Times, California Department of Public Health Deputy Director Heidi Steinecker wrote, “We do supply our staff with proper PPE, and testing; our staff’s safety is important to us.” She did not respond to further questions.