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The Biden administration is expected to begin distributing a whopping 400 million free N95 masks to Americans all over the country. The masks are coming from the Strategic National Stockpile and will be distributed via local pharmacies and community health centers. The number of masks being distributed comprise about half of our National Stockpile.
The Omicron variant of COVID-19 is hitting the elderly and nursing homes particularly hard, with the highest number of cases ever documented among staff and a near-record number of residents falling ill with the virus. This, on top of a worker shortage which has hit virtually every industry, has made this particularly difficult to deal with. For the week ending January 9, there were 32,061 new confirmed COVID-19 cases among nursing home residents, nearly triple the number of cases the week before (6,406), according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).
https://www.wsj.com/articles/covid-19-cases-surge-at-nursing-homes-11641924320
The White House has announced that private health insurers will soon have to cover the cost of in-home COVID-19 tests, as long as they are authorized, cleared or approved by the Food & Drug Administration (FDA). The new policy, which starts on Saturday, would allow for eight free tests per month. “We are requiring insurers and group health plans to make tests free for millions of Americans. This is all part of our overall strategy to ramp-up access to easy-to-use, at home tests at no cost,” Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said in a news release. This is great news, because there are many people who have been vaccinated and had a booster which have been tested positive with the new strain of coronavirus which is spreading rapidly.
Telehealth has become a normal part of the daily life of seniors, although there has been a big behind the scene battle being played out as Medicare has threatened to stop reimbursing for these visits once the pandemic has lifted. However, with the new Omicron strain of COVID-19 spreading like wildfire, for now, at least, Medicare has backed down and extended coverage of remote health care through at least 2023. Granted, it does have its limitations. For instance, patients and physicians worry that the lack of face-to-face visits won’t allow the doctor to pick up on subtle clues about the patient’s health that body language might reveal with a personal visit. However, with 52.7 million Medicare visits clocked last year versus only 840K in 2019, clearly something is working!
The U.S. Food & Drug Administration or FDA today announced the new rules for booster shots. Seniors 65 years of age and older, individuals 18-64 those are at high risk of developing severe COVID and those exposed to the virus either through their work or living situation are also eligible. “After considering the totality of the available scientific evidence and the deliberations of our advisory committee of independent, external experts, the FDA amended the EUA for the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine to allow for a booster dose in certain populations such as health care workers, teachers and day care staff, grocery workers and those in homeless shelters or prisons, among others,” acting FDA Commissioner Dr. Janet Woodcock said in a statement.
Scientific advisers to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are meeting tomorrow to decide which Americans should get COVID-19 booster shots and when. The decision will be closely watched after advisers to the Food and Drug Administration on Friday overwhelmingly rejected a proposal to offer Pfizer booster shots to all Americans over the age of 16 and then unanimously voted in favor of third doses for those over 65 and some high risk groups. The experts confirmed that a third dose does boost antibody levels, although it’s unclear how long that increase lasts or whether it translates to a meaningful boost in protection against severe disease.
Medical start-up EmitBio thinks it may have a solution for those suffering from low-grade coronavirus, and even the flu and other viruses. It is testing a handheld LED device that delivers light with precise frequencies, which, when shined to the back of a patient’s nose and throat, can provoke an immune response. So far, the results look good, with 99.99% elimination of the delta variant of coronavirus in lung cells after three days of shining the light twice a day for about five minutes. The device could even be used at home. What an amazing technology.
There is no question that there is a major labor shortage, we are suffering from this ourselves. A recent report said that senior housing facilities are also being hard hit, with employees hard to find and commercial property values sinking as few investors want to be in this type of industry. However, it’s unclear that many are doing everything in their power to please the customers. About 39% of senior housing associations surveyed between July 22 and August 8 said that they definitely or probably would impose vaccine mandates. That’s a surprisingly low number. We have seen an influx of new clients due to adult children moving their parents out of facilities due to their fear of COVID-19. That’s only likely to increase as new variants spread. Thankfully, President Biden has stepped in and said that if nursing homes don’t require workers to be vaccinated against COVID-19 they will no longer receive Medicare or Medicaid funding. The current nursing home vaccination rate sits at only 61.5%, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. This is only a hair above the total population. Some nursing home executives have bristled at the new Biden mandate, stating that staff departures may exceed 20%. Good riddance I say to the anti-vaxers. Keep them away from our seniors.
Sadly, many senior citizens have not been fully vaccinated against COVID-19, which is causing hospitalizations across the country to soar as the highly contagious delta variant spreads rapidly. The U.S. can now boast that is has a much higher share of seniors without full vaccine protection than many other wealthy countries, which means that we will likely see a disproportionate number of deaths of senior Americans compared to other developed countries. In contrast, unvaccinated seniors in Britain, Canada and Spain are very rare. Even London, which has higher rates of vaccine hesitancy among seniors than the rest of Britain, is far ahead of the United States in its vaccination rates. Thankfully, California is doing much better than other states. Low elderly vaccination rates in Arkansas, Florida, Idaho, Louisiana and Nevada have coincided with surging rates of hospitalizations and deaths. Next on the list are likely to be Colorado, Kansas and North Dakota which have not yet experienced severe Delta outbreaks but has low senior vaccination rates.
At last, the FDA has approved both the Pfizer and the BioNTech vaccines. They are no longer approved only for experimental use which will shoot down one of the last excuses that anti-vaxers have been using as an excuse not to get vaccinated. This is where the rubber meets the road and those not getting vaccinated are going to have to try and come up with another excuse for doing what the majority of Americans have done—get vaccinated against the coronavirus. Shortly after the approval, the Pentagon announced that it would require all active-duty military to be vaccinated (only 64% now are) and President Biden put the pressure on private companies to do the same. “Today I’m calling on more companies in the private sector to step up with vaccine requirements that will reach millions to do that,” he said. Johnson & Johnson and Moderna are expected to submit paperwork to get full approval by the end of the year. This is definitely great news as hospitalizations from COVID-19 are surging as the Delta variant continues to spread.