Pa. program that fights nursing home COVID outbreaks is out of money

Pa. program that fights nursing home COVID outbreaks is out of money 

By The Associated Press and WLVR Staff

January 14, 2021

Officials in Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration say the state doesn’t have the money to maintain a key feature of the state’s response to coronavirus outbreaks in Pennsylvania’s nursing homes. And they are working to retain a short-term, scaled-down model now that federal funding ran out. 

Human Services Secretary Teresa Miller told reporters on Jan. 13 the administration is running a bare-bones version of a program that distributed $175 million in federal coronavirus aid to 11 regional health systems to help contain outbreaks in nursing homes. 

“A scaled back program is what we must do to continue the core function of rapid response as much as possible,” she says. “We must understand that without dedicated funds allocated our resources are more limited.” 

Because of limited funds, the new rapid response teams will only assign emergency workers for up to five days  instead of up to two weeks.

Miller says the partnership has helped save lives and her department will continue to ask the federal government for more money to continue the program.

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