Nursing home operators must have been speeding to buy lottery tickets on Sept. 10. After two days of unexpectedly good news from the White House and regulators, who could have blamed anyone if they wanted  to indulge in some extra-audacious fantasizing?

After all, while they had hoped for the events of Sept. 9 and 10 for a while, nobody was sure when — or if  — they would happen.

One thing’s sure, though: None of the fortuitous events happened by coincidence. Maybe there’s something to the saying that if you howl loud and long enough, you’ll get somebody’s attention.

For many months, nursing homes had been begging authorities to make available the remaining $25.5 billion in provider federal relief funding. Then, it just happened on a Friday morning (Sept. 10). Hopefully you’ve already filed for your fair share by now. 

For three weeks before that announcement, however, nursing homes also had been howling about the unfair treatment of being solely designated for a staff COVID-19 vaccination mandate by the federal government.

“CMS needs to finish the job,” I wrote in an Aug. 20 blog post on mcknights.com, adding my voice to the mix. “Don’t punch a hole in the bottom of long-term care’s already leaky workforce boat and walk away.” At a minimum, include other healthcare sectors, I said. 

On Sept. 9, President Biden did just that, and then some. That afternoon, the administration added other healthcare providers and tens of millions of other U.S. workers to the “get it done” list.

It’s generally not proper to wish burdens on others, but at least now the challenge has become how to keep everyone’s boat afloat, not just nursing homes’. That’s how it should be, of course. Public health matters do not exist simply for an individual’s sake, no more than public driving rules exist only for those who feel like heeding red lights at busy intersections.

The pandemic is far from over. But it’s no longer just nursing homes’ problem. As if it ever was.

In the aforementioned blog post, I had two pleas for CMS and its forthcoming vaccination mandate plan: Make it workable and make it fair.

The agency took a giant leap toward doing at least the latter, while possibly also helping the former, during a pivotal 20-hour span across two memorable days in September. Such victories are rare in this line of work. Savor and capitalize on them.

From the October 2021 Issue of McKnight's Long-Term Care News