The following is the latest COVID-19 information from Pennsylvania state and federal officials as of 4:00 p.m. on Wednesday, April 15.
Pennsylvania Update
Governor Wolf
- The governor’s office issued a news release today in which it announced that it is “…offering taxpayers increased flexibility, additional time to meet their tax obligations, and a pause on several of its standard enforcement actions.” Go here to see the news release with more details about the specific changes.
- Governor Wolf has established a COVID-19 Response Task Force for Health Disparity to look into and address how COVID-10 affects minorities. Lieutenant Governor John Fetterman will serve as its chairman.
Daily COVID-19 Briefing
- The number of new COVID-19 cases has declined for the third consecutive day.
- But yesterday’s death toll was among the highest since the pandemic began.
- 1327 health care workers have tested positive for COVID-19.
- Health Department staff took a “deep dive” on the data on the status of COVID-19 in long-term-care facilities and has significantly increased both the case and the death totals in those facilities to 3316 residents of such facilities with COVID-19 and 324 deaths attributed to the disease. The latter figure accounts for nearly one-half of all COVID-19 deaths state-wide.
- 2392 people are currently hospitalized with COVID-19 and 662 are on ventilators.
- 41 percent of the state’s acute-care beds and 39 percent of its ICU beds are currently unoccupied and nearly 70 percent of its ventilators are currently not in use.
- Both Secretary Levine and Governor Wolf said that Pennsylvania is “bending the curve.”
- Governor Wolf expressed opposition to the bill passed by the state House that would give county governments greater authority over which businesses can remain open during the COVID-19 emergency but when asked did not say he would veto the bill.
- A new mass testing site will open on the premises of the Mohegan Sun casino in Wilkes-Barre.
- The Montgomery County mass testing site has relocated and opened.
- Secretary Levine said she did not know why hospital uncompensated care rose in 2019, as reported today by the Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council, but she said she is not worried about the impact of COVID-19 on this year’s total because the federal government has said it will pay for care for uninsured people suffering from COVID-19.
Department of Health
Secretary Levine has issued an order directing public health safety measures for businesses permitted to maintain public operation during the COVID-19 emergency. The order encompasses “…certain actions to be taken by employers and their employees to protect their health and lives, the health and lives of their families, and the health and lives of the residents of the Commonwealth who depend upon their services. Special consideration is required to protect not only customers, but the workers needed to run and operate these establishments.”- Earlier this week Secretary Levine wrote to industry leaders directing them to specific web pages within the Department of Health’s web site for updated information, guidance, alerts, and more. There are separate sites for:
Department of Human Services
DHS’s Office of Long-Term Living has issued clarification guidance for Pennsylvania’s pre-admission screening resident review (PASRR) process for nursing homes. This clarification comes in the wake of guidance from the CMS Center for Clinical Standards and Quality that addresses a blanket waiver CMS has issued indicating that nursing facilities will not be cited for non-compliance with federal PASRR requirements. While Pennsylvania requested and received approval from CMS that would permit the state to suspend the PASSR assessment process for 30 days, the state has decided to continue performing PASRR activities through remote means and will only invoke the blanket waiver on a case-by-case basis. See the clarification guidance for further details.
General Assembly
The Senate met to consider S.B. 613 on concurrence in amendments passed in the House yesterday. During debate, Senate Republicans pointed to the bill’s requirement that businesses comply with CDC guidance for mitigating exposure to COVID-19 before reopening while Senate Democrats argued that the timing of this legislation would detract from the mitigation efforts of the governor and Secretary of Health. The bill was passed by the Senate along party lines and now goes to the governor for action.
S.B. 327 was also considered on concurrence in amendments from the House. The bill was amended in the Senate today to delegate authority to counties to develop emergency mitigation plans for businesses. Senate Democrats expressed concern about this amendment not establishing a statewide, uniform approach to addressing the pandemic. The bill was adopted along party lines and will return to the House for its concurrence with the Senate’s additional amendments.
The House has added tomorrow, April 16, as a non-voting session day and April 20 and 21 as voting session days. The Senate stands in recess until the call of the President Pro Tempore.
Federal Update
The White House
Yesterday President Trump announced the creation of the Dynamic Ventilator Reserve program through which health care providers with a surplus of ventilators will be able to share their reserves with hospitals that need additional ventilators. Hospitals, the president noted when discussing this program, are already doing this, and he said the federal government will develop a reserve of ventilators to support this program. Interested parties can learn more here.
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services
- CMS has published a notice describing new waivers for inpatient prospective payment system hospitals, long-term-care hospitals (LTCHs), and inpatient rehabilitation facilities (IRFs) required by the CARES Act.
- For acute-care hospitals, the waiver addresses coding for COVID-19 patients and increases relative weights for DRGs for those patients retroactive to January 27, thereby increasing payments 20 percent.
- For IRFs, the waiver eliminates the requirement that Medicare Part A patients receive at least 15 hours of therapy a week.
- For LTCHs, the waiver temporarily pays all LTCH cases through the LTCH prospective payment system retroactive to January 27 and modifies the calculation of the LTCH 50 percent rule, thereby increasing some LTCH payments.
- CMS has announced that it will nearly double payments for certain lab tests that use high-throughput technologies to rapidly diagnose large numbers of COVID-19 tests.
Health Resources and Services Administration
HRSA is temporarily waiving fees for skilled health care practitioner license queries of the National Practitioner Data Bank to facilitate the deployment of workforce resources.
Food and Drug Administration
- The FDA has updated its FAQs on diagnostic testing for COVID-19.
- The FDA has issued an emergency use authorization for the use of a specific commercial technology to assist in weaning patients determined by health care providers to be at high risk of weaning failure off breathing assistance machines requiring intubation for no more than 30 days.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
The CDC has updated its interim guidance for collecting, handling, and testing clinical specimens for patients with COVID-19 and those suspected of having COVID-19.- The CDC has updated its COVID-19 infection control guidance.
Medicare Payment Advisory Commission
- MedPAC has written to CMS administrator Seema Verma asking her not to use data from 2020 when evaluating the performance of Medicare accountable care organizations (ACOs); to allow a three-year extension of the NextGen ACO model through 2023; and to delay the start of the innovation direct contracting model by at least a year.
Resources to Consult
Pennsylvania Department of Human Services
Pennsylvania Department of Health
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
New resource:
The health alerts published on this page include emergency-related information the Department of Health wishes to communicate to public health agencies, health care providers, hospitals, and emergency management officials.
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