MINNEAPOLIS — The pandemic has punished long-term care facilities like no other setting in the United States, killing more than 130,000 residents nationwide.
In an address to the nation on Wednesday, President Joe Biden cited this statistic before announcing a new vaccine mandate for nursing home employees. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services are now in the process of creating an emergency regulation that will require all staff in 15,000 Medicare and Medicaid facilities to receive COVID-19 vaccinations, or else those facilities would lose federal funding.
"I'm using the power of the federal government, as a payer of health care costs, to ensure we reduce those risks to our most vulnerable seniors," Biden said. "If you visit, live, or work in a nursing home, you should not be at higher risk for contracting COVID from unvaccinated employees."
The new rule will have major implications for Minnesota, where CDC data shows that 67% of nursing home staff are vaccinated, compared to 91% of residents.
Kristine Sundberg, the executive director of Elder Voice Family Advocates in Minnesota, applauded the Biden administration for mandating staff vaccinations in long-term care facilities that participate in Medicare and Medicaid.
"This is wonderful news. It is literally going to save many, many lives," Sundberg said. "It's long overdue, but I'm delighted to see it's happening."
However, at least one national group representing providers expressed concerns on Wednesday. Mark Parkinson, the president and CEO of the American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living, released a statement saying "we appreciate the Administration's efforts to increase COVID-19 vaccinations in long term care" but that "unfortunately, this action does not go far enough."
Parkinson said it's unfair to single out nursing homes, and that "vaccination mandates for health care personnel should be applied to all health care settings."
"Focusing only on nursing homes will cause vaccine hesitant workers to flee to other health care providers and leave many centers without adequate staff to care for residents. It will make an already difficult workforce shortage even worse," Parkinson said. "The net effect of this action will be the opposite of its intent and will affect the ability to provide quality care to our residents. We look forward to working with the Administration in the coming days to develop solutions to overcome this challenge."
Nationwide, about 62% of long-term care staff are fully vaccinated.
But that still means thousands of workers remain hesitant.
"Please, please, think about the people you're caring for," Kristine Sundberg said in a direct plea to unvaccinated workers in nursing homes. "They need to be protected."