Waiting on U.S. Mandate rules, Some Nursing Homes Are Slow to Vaccinate Staff

...  nursing homes were not impervious to the highly contagious variant that swept through many states with lower vaccination rates. Ten states, including Florida, Michigan and Ohio, still report vaccination rates for nursing home staff under 60 percent.

Others, like New York and California, and some large nursing home chains have imposed their own mandates. But many nursing home administrators are waiting for the federal government to issue new rules that will govern a mandatory vaccination program for all their staff members that President Biden first announced two months ago. And some facilities and labor groups are still pushing for a testing option in lieu of a shot. ...

After steep declines earlier this year, Covid cases and deaths in nursing homes climbed in August and September, resulting in about 4,000 deaths — even though nearly 90 percent of the nation’s nursing home residents were fully vaccinated. Residents are particularly vulnerable to breakthrough infections because so many are older and suffer from serious medical conditions, like the multiple myeloma the former secretary of state Colin Powell was being treated for when he died from complications of Covid on Monday.

“It is medically wrong and borders on unethical to have unvaccinated nursing home staff caring for residents,” said Dr. Michael Wasserman, a geriatrician and former nursing home executive who has become a critic of the industry. “The vaccine works. It has made a profound difference.”

The Biden administration has said that nursing homes could face a loss of government funding — the industry heavily relies on Medicaid and Medicare funds — if they do not comply, but the regulations for enforcement of a mandate have yet to be disclosed.

Federal officials say they expect to issue the regulations sometime later this month. The rules were delayed from last month after the mandate was broadened to include all health care workers. ...