Amid mounting public pressure, the Minnesota Department of Health released stark new data on the deadly impact of the novel coronavirus on long-term care facilities across the state.
The data were released late Friday in response to a threat of a legislative subpoena by a prominent lawmaker and provide the most detailed look yet into the types of long-term care facilities where people are dying of the virus and the state's efforts to contain its spread through more aggressive testing and inspections.
As public health experts had warned, residents and staff of Minnesota's nursing homes are the most vulnerable to COVID-19, the deadly respiratory disease caused by the coronavirus, accounting for two-thirds of all deaths in long-term care. As of June 1, nursing homes reported 2,973 cases and 608 deaths from the virus statewide. Assisted-living facilities, which typically provide a less-intensive level of care, had 1,243 cases and 259 deaths, the state said. Another 29 residents have died of the virus in specialized memory care units, the agency said.
Large and deadly clusters of the virus have begun appearing in more nursing homes, where a combination of factors — chronic understaffing, infection-control problems, tight living quarters and a frail population — have contributed to the virus' spread.
In Minnesota, nursing homes house and care for about half as many residents as less regulated assisted-living facilities. However, they tend to care for older people with more underlying health conditions. They also have more dense physical layouts, with residents often doubled up in rooms and as many as four people sharing a single bathroom. The hospital-like design of many nursing homes was intended to be cost-efficient, but it has contributed to the rapid spread of the virus, public health experts maintain.
The nursing homes that have been hit hardest are St. Therese of New Hope, with 67 deaths, and North Ridge Health and Rehab, also of New Hope, with 57 deaths. Another 38 people have died at Southview Acres Healthcare Center in West St. Paul; and 29 have died at Augustana Chapel View Care Center in Hopkins, according to the state data released Friday.
The information released Friday follows on the heels of a trove of data released last week by the federal government, which also included facility-level information on COVID-19 outbreaks. For the first time, members of the public can search by nursing home facility name on the federal website Nursing Home Compare to identify the scope of the outbreaks in specific facilities. However, the federal data exclude assisted-living facilities, which are part of the state's report.
Until the state released this accounting, families with relatives in long-term care had repeatedly been denied information on the size of the COVID-19 outbreaks in specific facilities. Without such data, some families argued, they had difficulty making informed decisions about where to place their loved ones. In some cases, residents and families said facilities did not tell them that COVID-19 had spread widely in their facilities, making it impossible to avoid the contagion.
