Two Vermont elder care homes are facing growing outbreaks as the state’s Covid cases swell to record numbers.
Twenty-six residents and 12 staff have tested positive at Rutland Healthcare and Rehabilitation Center, Human Services Secretary Mike Smith reported on Tuesday. The outbreak has grown from nine cases last week.
Four Seasons Care Home in Northfield has also reported 20 Covid cases, including 17 residents and three staff.
The first resident tested positive after going to the hospital on Nov. 9 for a different procedure, said Ashley Hudson, a co-owner at Four Seasons. A few residents had mild symptoms of fever and a cough, but most have been asymptomatic, Hudson wrote in an email to VTDigger.
“Many of the residents have been bewildered as [the owners] shared with them the news of their positive test results,” she said. They run facility-wide testing for all 30 residents every Wednesday and Saturday, she said.
The facility has now closed to outside visitors, and stopped group activities and shared meals. “We are hopeful that things will start to dissipate,” she said. But with eight shared bathrooms, residents who are prone to wander or have cognitive impairment, as well as asymptomatic residents, “we remain concerned that we haven’t seen the last of our positive cases.”
None of those who tested positive at either location have been hospitalized.
The cases are part of Vermont’s largest Covid surge to date. The state reported multiple single-day records in the last week and 600 cases over the past seven days, surpassing the April peak.
One resident at Rutland Health and Rehab has died, said Richard Feifer, chief medical officer for Genesis, the national company that owns the facility.
The positive cases have also caused staffing shortages. Genesis has brought in temporary staff from other facilities and from a staffing agency, Feifer said.
Though the state has clamped down on multi-household gatherings, there have been no such restrictions on nursing homes.
That’s because the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services doesn’t permit states to prohibit indoor visitation unless a resident or staff tests positive or the county has at least a 10% positivity rate, Smith said. Nursing homes that violate those rules could lose federal funding.
Officials at the Vermont Agency of Human Services have asked for an exemption, or a waiver, from CMS to protect older Vermonters. “You have a significant change of introducing the coronavirus into the facility at that level,” Smith said, referring to the 10% positivity rate.
For now, the state has recommended weekly or biweekly testing of staff members at all elder care homes, and has offered funding to support the effort.
“We’re counting on all our facilities to be vigilant and prevent the introduction of the virus into the buildings,” Smith said.
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