Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele, Jr. today announced that he helped pass a series of bills to increase safety and improve the quality of life for New Yorkers living in nursing homes. This package reimagines nursing home care, increases oversight and transparency, prepares for future public health threats, guarantees safe nursing home visitation and cracks down on unscrupulous nursing home operators that put profits over people.

The COVID-19 pandemic has now raged on for a year and claimed the lives of tens of thousands of New Yorkers. Tragically, a significant number of these deaths were those who lived in nursing homes and adult care facilities. New Yorkers who lost loved ones in nursing homes faced unimaginable challenges on top of their grief, including a lack of clear communication and an inability to visit their family member or hold a proper memorial service.

The legislative package includes a measure that would establish the Reimagining Long-Term Care Task Force to study the state of long-term care services and challenges in New York, including issues specifically related to the COVID-19 pandemic (A.3922-A, Cruz). This measure has been passed by both the Assembly and the Senate.

Other measures included would prioritize sanitation efforts in nursing homes and adult care facilities, including a bill that would require the establishment of an antimicrobial stewardship program and training on antimicrobial resistance and control (A.5847, Woerner). Also passed was a bill that would require adult care facilities to include infection control assessments in their regular quality assurance plans, and require these facilities to create a quality improvement committee (A.5846, Kim). The Assembly also passed legislation that would codify New York regulations and federal law that establish certain requirements prior to an individual being transferred or discharged from a residential health care facility (A.3919, Hevesi).

For many individuals living in nursing homes, visitation from family and loved ones provides critical informal channels of care that are crucial to their well-being. Yesterday, the Assembly passed a measure that would allow exemptions for personal care visitors and enhanced compassionate care visitation during declared

local or state health emergencies (A.1052-B, Bronson). Another bill passed by the Assembly would prohibit granting of new for-profit nursing home licenses or expanding the capacity of existing for-profit nursing homes (A.5842, Gottfried).

The package also includes the Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program Reform Act to increase the effectiveness of the program (A.5436-A, Clark). Another bill would codify the Health Emergency Response Data System (HERDS) under the Department of Health (DOH), and require information collected under the system be published on the DOH website (A.244-A, Gottfried).

Other legislation the Assembly passed as a part of the legislative package would require each residential health care facility to provide residents and their families with a separate document as part of an intake application that includes information on how and where a potential resident and their family members can look up complaints, citations, inspections, enforcement actions and penalties taken against the facility, as well as nursing home quality information provided by the state and federal governments (A.5848, Wallace).

Finally, legislation was passed to repeal Article 30-D of the Public Health Law, also known as the Emergency or Disaster Treatment Protection Act, to ensure that health care facilities, administrators and executives are held accountable for harm and damages incurred (A.3397, Kim).¹

“As vaccine distribution continues to ramp up and we can see the light at the end of tunnel, we must take what we’ve learned to better protect at-risk populations and help ensure all New Yorkers receive the high- quality care they need,” Assemblyman Thiele stated. “We owe it to nursing home and adult care facility residents and staff, and their families and caregivers, to improve safety standards and promote accountability. I was proud to vote in favor of each of the important measures included in the nursing home reform package.”