They Work In Several Nursing Homes To Eke Out A Living, That Spreads The Coronavirus

[appalachiablue]

'Coronavirus Crisis: They Work In Several Nursing Homes To Eke Out A Living, & That Spreads The Virus.' NPR, 10/26/20.

To make ends meet, Martha Tapia works 64 hours a week at two different Orange County, Calif., nursing homes. She is one of thousands of certified nursing assistants who perform the intimate and physical work of bathing, dressing and feeding the nation's fragile elderly.

"We do everything for them. Everything you do for yourself, you have to do for the residents," Tapia says. And she's one of many in that low-paid field, predominantly women of color, who work at more than one facility.

In March, when the coronavirus began racing through nursing homes the federal government banned visitors. (That guidance has since been updated.) But, even with the ban, infections kept spreading. A team of researchers from UCLA and Yale University decided to examine the people who continued to enter nursing homes in that time — the employees. Keith Chen, a behavioral economist and UCLA professor, says the key question is this: "The people who, we can infer, work in this nursing home — what other nursing homes do they work at?"

Using location data from 30 million smartphones when the visitor ban was in place helped the scientists "see" the movements of people going into and out of nursing homes. The data showed a lot of nursing home workers are — like Tapia — working at more than one facility. Chen says the findings suggest that one source of the spread of infections is staff who work in multiple nursing homes.

"When you learn that over 20 of your workers are also spending time in other nursing homes, that should be a real red flag," Chen says. The toll on patients and beyond...

More, https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/10/26/927841874/they-work-in-several-nursing-homes-to-eke-out-a-living-and-that-spreads-the-viru
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MORE:

- Trump Team Relaxed Training Rules For Nursing Home Staff Just As Pandemic Hit, Politico, July 15, 2020. Caregivers can obtain a license in 8 hrs online, after which they’re responsible for protecting vulnerable residents.
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/07/15/coronavirus-nursing-homes-361510

- Trump Admin. Deregulation of Nursing Homes Leaves Seniors, Disabled At Higher Risk of Covid, Amer. Progress, 2019.
https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/disability/news/2020/04/21/483545/trump-administrations-deregulation-nursing-homes-leaves-seniors-disabled-higher-risk-covid-19/

..The nursing home lobby rebelled against this increased level of oversight and rising penalties. The inauguration of President Donald Trump and the growing Republican control of Congress saw the beginning of a robust advocacy campaign by the industry to roll back the changes, citing the onerous nature of the standards and the severity of the financial penalties.

In March 2017, lobbyists for the nursing home industry also began advocating for changes to the Nursing Home Reform Act. They argued that fines should be significantly lessened or eliminated if there was no harm done to residents or if the situation took place before an inspection. They also asked to eliminate the requirement for nursing homes to evaluate the staffing levels needed to provide adequate care—and wanted residents to agree to binding arbitration should they seek to sue at some point in the future...

[Phoenix61]

1. If they weren't using warehousing our elderly

as a cash stream they could pay their staff enough so they wouldn’t have to work 70-60 hours a week.

[appalachiablue]

2. It's appalling. Trump Admin relaxed training rules for staff

and less inspection --huge cost savers-- just before the pandemic hit, the topic of an article I added above. Only 8 hrs. of training to hire less experienced workers who can be paid less.. Low pay, no benefits and long, long hours, the same goal for public school teachers.

[Wellstone ruled]

3. Just had this conversation with

our Niece about the Nursing home her Father just entered. She knows all the Staff,and she made a similiar statement over the weekend. Two of theWorkers have tested positive and said to her,we need the hours because we need the money.

[KT2000]

4. Common practice

The employee comes down with Covid and the testing of residents and staff has to be done at both , (sometimes three) facilities, each time it happens.