Whether it’s making plans to hug their grandchildren, scheduling long-overdue medical appointments or just petting the neighbor’s dog, seniors are inching back to a lifestyle they’ve missed during the pandemic.
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Federal records show a steep decline in staff covid cases since December, when health care workers at thousands of nursing homes began getting their shots. Still, many are reluctant to get vaccinated.
As the recent winter storm disaster in Texas showed, many long-term care sites aren’t required to have backup power supplies or other redundancies to keep residents safe when disaster strikes.
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Relatives and advocates are calling for federal authorities to relax restrictions in long-term care institutions and grant special status to “essential caregivers” — family members or friends who provide critically important hands-on care — so they have the opportunity to tend to relatives in need.
Health organizations have begun sending doctors and nurses to apartment buildings and private homes to vaccinate homebound seniors, but the efforts are slow and spotty.