Dear Speaker Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Schumer,
As the terrible COVID-19 pandemic spreads throughout the United States and COVID patients either return home with active symptoms or shelter-in-place with the virus, home and community-based services (HCBS) become more vital than ever in reducing spread and caring for society’s most vulnerable. The federal government must provide adequate resources for these services.
Home care workers prepare meals, assist with toileting, bathing, dressing, medication, and prevent social isolation of some of the most vulnerable. These workers prevent hospitalizations, enabling clients to stay in their homes and lowering the cost to the healthcare system. Now, more than ever, we rely on this essential workforce to provide the necessary support for those who are homebound, as well as those discharged from hospitals.
Now, in addition to all of their regular vulnerable clients most of whom are immuno-compromised and at particular risk for COVID-19, home care workers and providers must also be prepared to care for those COVID patients who return home. We must ensure that they have the resources, including proper personal protective equipment and enhanced compensation to care for all of their clients. As we know, this public health crisis will not be over in one wave and we must be prepared to both to care for the vulnerable population of home care clients, and COVID patients who return home, while also reducing the risk of continued spread to essential workers and their communities.
These vital support services are threatened. Home care providers have been left out of new health care funding and the distribution of necessary personal protective equipment’s for workers and family members who face hardship and have been touched by the disease. Home care workers, as they have always done, are traveling on public transportation to ensure clients get the services they need, at various hours of the day, risking their own safety to provide the care needed for thousands of individuals throughout the community care setting. Home care providers have experienced significant increased administrative and equipment costs with decreased revenue and without any additional reimbursement.
Providers need to be equipped and to respond to COVID patients who are being discharged from the hospitals, as well as continuing to care for all of their otherwise immune-compromised clients at great risk of infection. Providers, more than ever, must be able to recruit and retain workers to care for the most vulnerable among us. Without
additional resources, the home and community-based services system will fail at the great tasks before them.
The Federal Government should increase FMAP for Home and Community Based Services to ensure sufficient resources are available, and require the State Medicaid programs to:
o Provide pass-through funding to providers for worker support, including additional compensation and sick pay, childcare and transportation subsidies.
o Reimburse home care providers for additional COVID- and shutdown- related administrative costs, including telehealth systems, PPE supplies, and employee retention.
Thank you for your consideration of these funding needs. We urge you to take swift action to provide the needed support for home and community-based services (HCBS) in response to COVID-19.
Respectfully,
George Gresham, President
1199SEIU
Gabriele Sofos
Executive Director
FEGS Home Attendant Services
Mendy Kaff
Executive Director
Home Attendant Services of Hyde Park
Samuel Kornitzer
Acting Executive Director
Home Health Management Inc.
Fanny Quinones
RN DPS Program Director
Alliance Home Services, Inc.
Roberto Samedy
Executive Director
BHRAGS Home Care Corp.
Simone Mayhew
Director of Home Care
St. Nicks Alliance Home Care
Gladys V. Confident
Executive Director
Home care Services for Independent Living, Inc.
Jenny Chan, MPA
President/CEO
ABC Health Service Reg. Inc.
Donna McNamara
VP Chief Operating Office
Unlimited Care, Inc.
Gregory Turchan
President & Chief Operating Officer
Premier Home Care
Jordan N. Shames
President & CEO
Neighbors Home Care
Broughan Gorey
President
Family Home Care Services of Brooklyn and Queens
Chief Executive Officer
PSC Community Services, Inc.
Susan Brett
Chief Operating Officer/Senior Vice President
People Care, Inc.
Anna Fong
Acting Executive Director
First Chinese Presbyterian Community
Affairs Home Attendant Corporation
Adria Powell
President and CEO
Cooperative Home Care Associates
Glenmore Matthews
Vice President, Homecare
RiseBoro Homecare Inc.
Denise Tripodi
VP NY LHCSA Shared Services
Personal-Touch Home Care
Dana Arnone
RN owner
Reliance Home Senior Service