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U.S. NEWS Thursday 7 april 2022
Nursing home care, funding system need overhaul, report says

By MATT SEDENSKY cates have repeatedly said
AP National Writer is too low, too untrained
NEW YORK (AP) — Nursing and too underpaid, the re-
home residents are sub- port's authors called for fa-
jected to ineffective care cilities to have at least one
and poor staffing, while registered nurse on duty at
facility finances are shroud- all times and for an infec-
ed in secrecy and regula- tion prevention and control
tory lapses go unenforced, specialist and social worker
according to a report to also be on staff.
Wednesday that called More broadly, across all
for wholesale changes in staffing in homes, including
an industry whose failures nurse aides who make up
have been spotlighted by the bulk of front-line care-
the pandemic. givers, the authors called
To anyone who saw the for additional study on op-
scourge of COVID-19 on timal staffing.
the country's most vulner- Industry lobbyists have
able, the findings of the fiercely fought against
National Academies of Sci- more stringent staffing re-
ences, Engineering, and quirements. Federal law
Medicine might seem so- A woman holds onto the walker once belonging to her mother who died of COVID-19 while at a only requires nursing homes
bering but unsurprising, as nursing home, as her family prays before Thanksgiving dinner, Nov. 26, 2020, in Deer Park, N.Y. to have sufficient staff to
the long-term care system's Associated Press meet residents' needs, but
inadequacies were made nearly all interpretation of
plain by more than 150,000 tional issues that would able Care Act but later re- Katie Smith Sloan, who what that means is left to
resident deaths. The au- require massive political pealed when the Obama leads LeadingAge, which states. President Joe Biden,
thors of the 605-page report capital and investment administration found it un- represents nonprofit nursing too, has called for estab-
insist it could be an impetus to address. Among them: workable. homes, called the report lishing national staffing min-
to address issues that have the authors advocate for "It has been a long time "a piercing wake-up call" imums.
gotten little more than lip creating a new national since we as a country have about an industry "in des- Among the more routine
service for decades. long-term care system that been wanting to dig in and perate need of an over- subjects in the report, but
"The public is so concerned would exist outside of Med- reform how we finance, haul," but likewise said the one that nonetheless im-
about the quality of care icaid, the program that is pay, regulate and delivery success of remaking the pacts residents' everyday
that most people really at the center of most long- nursing home services," said system would depend on lives, the authors call for
fear their family having to term care financing. David Grabowski, a nursing how funding issues are ad- homes to prioritize private
be in a nursing home," said The likelihood of such a pro- home expert and Harvard dressed. rooms and bathrooms in-
Betty Ferrell, a nurse who posal successfully winding Medical School professor "As policymakers consider stead of the communal
chaired the report commit- its way through Congress who served on the report how to enact the report's ones that can fuel infec-
tee. "We're very optimistic seems low in the current committee. recommendations, they tions and underscore the
that our government of- political climate. The industry's biggest lobby- must back their actions institutional setting. And in
ficials will respond to what The most recent federal ing groups insisted reforms with sufficient funding to a blunt reminder of how
has really been a travesty." attempt to reform long- must be met by increased make changes a reality," bleak life in nursing homes
The report covers a vast term care financing was a government funding. she said. "Without that, the can be, the report notes
cross-section of long-term voluntary long-term care The American Health Care committee's work will be for most residents spend "little if
care, from granular details insurance program known Association said "what we naught." any time outdoors," calling
such as the way facilities as the CLASS Act. It was cannot support are un- On the issue of nursing for facilities to make outside
are designed to founda- included in the Afford- funded mandates." home staffing, which advo- access more accessible.q

U.S. official says Russians must access

the truth on Ukraine

LARNACA, Cyprus (AP) est in exposing Russian dis- to Ukraine, Nuland said
— Russian "disinforma- information, ensuring our Washington is in touch with
tion" about its war against citizens have the truth and other nations about sup-
Ukraine needs to be ex- ensuring that Russian citi- porting Ukraine "in any way
posed, including on Russia's zens also (have the truth) that they can."
"war crimes," a U.S. State ... despite the Iron Curtain "It is not for the United States
Department official said on that Putin has put down to ask of Cyprus. It is for Cy-
a visit to Cyprus Wednes- over that," Nuland said. prus to make its own deci-
day. Nuland was in Cyprus as sions about what it wants to
Undersecretary of State part of a five-nation tour and can do," she said.
Victoria Nuland said Rus- aimed at strengthening bi- Cypriot officials said no
sian "lies" have evolved to lateral ties and rallying sup- weapons would be trans-
the point of blaming Ukrai- port for Ukraine. ferred to Ukraine without
nians for actions by Rus- Asked whether the U.S. has securing replacements, U.S. Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, right, is joined
by Ukraine's Ambassador to Cyprus Ruslan Nimchynskyi at the
sian forces, including "the asked Cyprus to transfer its to avoid weakening the site of an anchor that the Ukrainian city of Odesa donated to
war crimes we see on the Russian-made weapons, war-divided island nation's the Cypriot coastal town of Larnaca during their twinning on
ground." including short-range anti- defenses.q Wednesday, April 6, 2022.
"So we all have an inter- aircraft batteries and tanks, Associated Press