State Senator Gustavo Rivera (S.D. 33), who represents parts of the Bronx, issued a statement on Wednesday, Sept. 29, on Gov. Kathy Hochul’s appointment of Mary Bassett MD, MPH, as the next State health department commissioner, following the recent resignation of Dr. Howard Zucker.

 

“Governor Hochul’s appointment of Dr. Mary Bassett as our State’s next health commissioner is a clear indication that she wants to quickly redirect the agency’s role back to its core mission— to protect and improve the health and well-being of all New Yorkers,” Rivera said. “Dr. Bassett, who will be the first African-American to lead the agency, has had an exemplary career focused on enacting forward-thinking, compassionate, and efficient public health initiatives and programs focused on reducing deeply rooted health disparities.”

 

 

State officials said with more than 30 years of experience devoted to promoting health equity and social justice, both in the United States and abroad, Bassett’s career has spanned academia, government, and not-for-profit work.

 

Hochul said the State’s recovery from the pandemic required tested leadership and experience to improve health equity and access across the state. “Dr. Bassett is perfectly equipped to lead the New York State Department of Health during this critical moment,” the governor said.

 

“When I was sworn in as Governor, I pledged to build a talented team with the skills, knowledge, and expertise to stop the spread of COVID-19, return our lives to normalcy, and move our state forward,” she added. “Dr. Bassett is both a highly regarded public health expert and an exemplary public servant, and I look forward to working with her to keep New Yorkers safe and healthy.”

 

Reacting to the new appointment, Bassett said, “I am humbled and honored to return to my home state of New York to lead the Department of Health at this pivotal time.” She added, “The pandemic underscored the importance of public health, while also revealing inequities driven by structural racism. As we move to end the pandemic, we have a unique opportunity to create a state that is more equitable for all New Yorkers. I look forward to working toward this with Governor Hochul and the team at the Department of Health.”

 

New York Attorney General Letitia James released the following statement on Sept. 23, after it was announced that Zucker had submitted his resignation from the State health department.

 

“Dr. Zucker’s resignation marks the end of a difficult chapter for our state. While I thank him for his service, we need more transparency and accountability at the Department of Health as we continue to battle COVID-19. I look forward to working with the next health commissioner, who must safeguard the health and wellbeing of all New Yorkers, especially the most vulnerable, and must do so with openness and great care.”

 

As reported, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the previous health commissioner, who the governor appointed, had been criticized for certain aspects of their handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly as it pertained to nursing homes.

 

Earlier this year, on Jan. 28, James’s office released a report entitled, “Nursing Home Response to COVID-19 Pandemic,” which among other findings, found that State DOH data undercounted the number of nursing home deaths from COVID-19 by as much as 50 percent, and that early State DOH guidance to nursing homes to re-admit COVID positive patients may have increased the risk of fatalities in those homes.

 

The report detailed the following preliminary findings:

A larger number of nursing home residents died from COVID-19 than Department of Health (DOH) data reflected. There was a lack of compliance with infection control protocols that put residents at increased risk of harm during the COVID-19 pandemic in some facilities. Nursing homes that entered the pandemic with low staffing ratings, according to the U.S. Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS), had higher COVID-19 fatality rates than those facilities with higher recorded CMS staffing ratings.

#COVID Update:

-190,260 Test Results Reported
-5,137 Positives
-2.70% Percent Positive
-2,348 Hospitalizations (-15)
-47 new deaths reported by healthcare facilities through HERDS pic.twitter.com/PxRRBMsMzl

— Kathy Hochul (@GovKathyHochul) September 29, 2021

 

Insufficient personal protective equipment (PPE) for nursing home staff put residents at increased risk of harm during the COVID-19 pandemic in some facilities. Insufficient COVID-19 testing for residents and staff in the early stages of the pandemic put residents at increased risk of harm in some facilities.

 

The report found that the current state reimbursement model for nursing homes gives a financial incentive to the owners of for-profit nursing homes to transfer funds to related parties (ultimately increasing the nursing homes’ own profits) instead of investing those funds in higher levels of staffing and PPE.

 

Lack of nursing home compliance with the executive order requiring communication by nursing homes with residents’ family members caused avoidable pain and distress. Government guidance requiring the admission of COVID-19 patients into nursing homes may have put residents at increased risk of harm, in some facilities, and may have obscured the data available to assess that risk. Below is a summary of the recommendations included in the report.

 

• Ensure public, accurate reporting by each nursing home of the COVID-19 residents’ deaths, and those that occur during or after hospitalization, avoiding any double-counting of residents’ deaths at hospitals.
• Ensure nursing homes provide adequate care and treatment of nursing home residents during times of emergency.
• Nursing homes must comply with labor practices that prevent them from pressuring employees to work while they have COVID-19 infection or symptoms, while ensuring the homes are adequately staffed.
• Ensure direct care and supervision staffing levels are in a ratio of residents to Registered Nurses, Licensed Practical Nurses, and Certified Nursing Assistants, require that ratio to be adjusted based on average residents care needs, ensure the ratio is above the current level reflected at nursing homes with low CMS staffing ratings and ensure sufficient care for residents’ needs is reflected in their care plans.
• Enforce more transparency in for-profit nursing homes, including on financial transactions and financial relationships between nursing home operators and related parties, and on relatives of all individual owners and officers of such entities who have contractual or investor relationships with the nursing home.
• Ensure nursing homes invest sufficiently in effective training so staff can fully comply with infection control protocols and hold operators accountable for failure to have clinically appropriate policies in place and failure to effectively train staff to comply with them.
• Manufacture PPE to ensure sufficient supply for purchase by nursing homes. require nursing homes to keep a sufficient inventory of PPE for all staff to be able to follow infection control protocols.
• Ensure adequate COVID-19 testing is available to nursing home residents and employees and enforce the testing in accordance with DOH and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) evidence-based guidelines.
• Eliminate recently enacted immunity provisions that can provide financial incentives to for profit nursing homes that put residents at risk of harm. Examples include not using public funds to obtain sufficient staffing to meet residents’ care needs when it was needed, not purchasing sufficient PPE for staff, and not providing effective training to staff to comply with infection control protocols during pandemics and other public health emergencies.
• Ensure nursing homes communicate with family members of residents promptly, but not later than 24 hours of any confirmed or suspected COVID-19 infection and of any confirmed or suspected COVID-19 death.
• Increase staffing at DOH to ensure sufficient skilled resources for oversight, complaint assessment, surveys, inspections, and immediate responses to information requests from state agencies in support of health care and law enforcement efforts.
• Ensure nursing homes engage in thoughtful planning regarding post-mortem care needs and implement and train staff on policies for dignified care of the remains of deceased residents.
• Urge families to consult the CMS Care Compare online database (medicare.gov/care-compare), ask questions of nursing homes relating to staffing, policies, procedures, and recent and current COVID-19 infections of staff and residents, and obtain information relevant to their current or future long-term care decisions for their loved ones.
• Where possible, visit family member residents in person and through “window” visits and videocalls even if residents are unable to communicate, to provide emotional support and to enable observation of the residents’ physical appearance and condition.
• Ensure family members know to report suspected neglect or abuse to DOH and OAG.

 

On its release, Richard Mollot, executive director of the Long Term Care Community Coalition (LTCCC) said, “This shocking yet unsurprising report must serve as a wake-up call that vulnerable residents and their families deserve better.” He added that many of the failures documented in this report had been going on for years and had only been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

 

According to the State DOH, to date, the statewide fatalities from COVID-19 reported to and compiled by the CDC total 56,674. This includes those who died in any location, including hospitals, nursing homes, adult care facilities, at home, in hospice and other settings.

 

To date, 4,649 Bronxites have died from COVID-19.