Seema Verma

Federal authorities have ratcheted up restrictions on nursing home visitors in just-issued guidance aimed at protecting seniors from the novel coronavirus.

In a press release and memo issued late Friday, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services provided details about the new policy. Among the new measures, it states that “facilities should restrict visitation of all visitors and non-essential health care personnel, except for certain compassionate care situations, such as an end-of-life situation.”

The guidance, which CMS calls the “most aggressive and decisive recommendations with respect to nursing home safety in the face of the spread of COVID-19” also includes cancelling all group activities and communal dining, and implementing active screening of residents and healthcare personnel for fever and respiratory symptoms. The guidance is based on the newest recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Exceptions to the visitation ban are healthcare workers and surveyors. And for those visitors who enter for compassionate care situations, they will be limited to one room only, and “facilities should require visitors to perform hand hygiene and use Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), such as facemasks.”

CMS Administrator Seema Verma gave a preview of this guidance Friday afternoon during a press conference with President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence. 

“It’s especially important now that we look after seniors with chronic, underlying health conditions,” Pence said. “Last week, the president directed the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to raise the standards in our nursing homes, increase inspections at our nursing homes. Today, we’re offering very specific guidance.”

The restrictions mirror what many facilities voluntarily instituted earlier last week, including temperature screenings of their own workers, but now puts a heavy official federal mandate in place.

“We fully appreciate that this measure represents a severe trial for residents of nursing homes and those who love them, but we are doing what we must to protect our vulnerable elderly,” Verma said.

Statistics out of China, where the current pandemic started, have shown that COVID-19 is many times more fatal for seniors than other age cohort, and 10 times more likely to kill than a regular influenza strain.