Marin County health officials are monitoring 20 coronavirus outbreaks in senior care centers as the contagion continues to prey on vulnerable targets.
According to the county, 76 senior home residents are infected along with 62 employees.
“We’ve had a couple of significant new outbreaks in the past week,” said Dr. Lisa Santora, the county’s deputy public health officer.
Santora declined to identify the sites of the outbreaks, but the Redwoods complex in Mill Valley said eight residents have tested positive since Christmas Eve.
All of the residents who tested positive live in the independent living section of the center, said Hunter Moore, chief executive of the Redwoods. The complex has two other types of housing: assisted living and skilled nursing care
“We tested everybody in independent living last week and all those tests came back negative,” Moore said.
Meanwhile, in San Rafael, more infections have been reported at Pine Ridge Care Center, according to a state-operated website. The administrator of the 101-bed center could not be reached for comment.
More than 84% of the coronavirus deaths in Marin have occurred among residents of senior care centers. With another death on Sunday, the nursing home death toll in Marin reached 103.
The new outbreaks are occurring despite efforts by Marin’s public health department and CVS Health to vaccinate residents and employees at senior care centers.
Marin began vaccinating skilled nursing center residents on Dec. 16 and CVS launched its efforts on Dec. 28. Santora said it can take eight days before vaccines begin to provide a level of protection against infection and as long as a month to build stronger resistance.
She said the new outbreaks also reflect the overall rate of spread in California. The current surge in cases is larger than any before it.
At the Redwoods, Moore said one of the residents who tested positive had to be hospitalized and another, who was receiving hospice care before testing positive, died. Moore said it is unclear whether the virus caused either the hospitalization or the death.
Moore said the first Redwoods resident tested positive on Dec. 24. That person was tested after two “private-duty” employees contracted the virus.
“A lot of residents are frail and have what they call a private-duty caregiver,” Moore said.
Such caregivers typically assist residents with such tasks as meal preparation, housekeeping, personal grooming and hygiene.
At the time of the infections, the Redwoods screened all private-duty caregivers when they entered the site. The caregivers had their temperature taken and were required to sign a form attesting that they had tested negative for the virus within the last week.
Nevertheless, Moore said, two caregivers entered without having had a test and with symptoms. The Redwoods is now requiring that caregivers demonstrate proof that they’ve been tested within the last week.
“It has proved a bit of a challenge for some people to get the test,” Moore said. “We’re trying to figure out if we’re going to be able to help them get that test.”
Moore said the Redwoods encourages employees not to come to work if they’re feeling ill and provides workers with sick pay so they can afford to stay home. He said private-duty caregivers, however, often do not get paid when they’re sick so they have an incentive to take more risks.
Marin County’s public health division has given residents and employees in skilled nursing centers the opportunity to receive both shots of the Pfizer vaccine. But it has ceded to CVS the responsibility of vaccinating the less frail assisted living population at senior centers.
The federal government has partnered with CVS and Walgreens to have the two chains send their pharmacists to senior care centers to administer the vaccine.
Neither Marin public health nor CVS is planning to offer vaccinations to people occupying independent living quarters at these sites.
“I’m furious,” said Sue Sanders, whose 88-year-old mother resides at the Redwoods. “These are the people who will die from this disease.”
Monica Prinzing, a spokeswoman for CVS, said the state of California authorized CVS to begin vaccinations at skilled-nursing sites on Dec. 28, followed by assisted-living and other long-term care locations on Jan. 11.
Santora said CVS was prevented from starting earlier because the state was deliberating whether to turn over a portion of its vaccine to CVS and Walgreens, as had been arranged by the federal government.
Santora said Marin County has lacked a large enough supply of vaccine to give shots to assisted living centers residents because of the arrangement with the pharmacy chains.
Santora said that next week the county will begin offering vaccinations to assisted living residents who haven’t been vaccinated by CVS. She said the county is still deciding whether to offer independent living residents the opportunity to be vaccinated next week. She said they might be told to seek vaccinations from their health care providers.
Moore said the county has vaccinated about 100 of the 175 employees at the Redwoods, and CVS has vaccinated some additional workers. He said the difficulty in getting all the employees vaccinated is that they work irregular hours, including nights and weekends.
"care" - Google News
January 20, 2021 at 08:00AM
https://ift.tt/35U6GbI
Coronavirus outbreaks continue at Marin senior care centers - Marin Independent Journal
"care" - Google News
https://ift.tt/2N6arSB
Shoes Man Tutorial
Pos News Update
Meme Update
Korean Entertainment News
Japan News Update
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "Coronavirus outbreaks continue at Marin senior care centers - Marin Independent Journal"
Post a Comment