A business owner putting up a sign requiring proof of vaccination

As the home care field was reeling over the fate of the federal vaccine mandate and the new threatening COVID-19 strain, the National Association for Home Care & Hospice Wednesday told providers to continue to recognize the CMS mandate. 

“We are advising NAHC members to continue to undertake, in good faith, all necessary measures to be compliant with Phase 1 and Phase 2 requirements of the rule except for any steps that would have been taken with staff that are not vaccinated or subject to an exception,” NAHC said in a statement. “We further advise providers to document any barriers to compliance.”

On Tuesday, a judge halted the CMS mandate nationwide. In light of this, the association asked the administration to suspend the CMS mandate, as the Occupational Health and Safety Administration did for its mandate after a federal appeals court upheld a stay on the mandate.

“We encourage the administration to take such a step to provide needed clarity to all health providers subject to the rule,” NAHC said. 

“We remain very concerned that CMS has issued no guidance on how providers should address any workforce shortages triggered by the rule in event that such leads to insufficient staff to care for existing patients or any new patient admissions,” NAHC added.

Per the CMS mandate, employees of home health agencies and other home care organizations that participate in the Medicare and Medicaid programs must receive a first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine prior to providing any care, treatment or other services by Dec. 6. Staff must be fully vaccinated by Jan. 4, 2022.

Prepared for omicron

Meanwhile, Addus HomeCare Chairman and CEO Dirk Allison assured Wall Street investors Wednesday the home care industry is prepared for uncertainty over the coronavirus omicron variant.

“We’ve been through two or three (COVID-19) surges and we’ve been able to get through it,” Allison said during a question and answer session at the Stephens Annual Investment Conference in Nashville.  “[The pandemic] has had a slight revenue impact, but from a profitability and a safety position with our employees, we’ve been able to get through it reasonably well. We feel very comfortable that we’re in a good position — should the new variant come through — that we should be prepared for that.”

Omicron is the latest variant of the COVID-19 virus to emerge. One case of the variant has already been detected in the U.S and other cases have been identified in a dozen more countries, including Canada.

Vaccination mandate reaction

Frisco, TX-based Addus has approximately 33,000 employees in 200 locations across the U.S. Addus President and Chief Operating Officer Brad Bickham said 90% of the company’s home healthcare workers and 80% of its hospice workers are fully vaccinated. However, only about 63% of its personal care employees have gotten COVID-19 vaccinations. He said the exception is New York, where a state vaccine mandate has prompted 95% of Addus workers to get the shots.

“We had a lot of initial holdouts, but when push came to shove, they decided to get vaccinated,” Bickham said. “So, I think the mandates were effective from that standpoint. When the drop dead date came, a lot of people who said there’s no way I’m going to get a vaccine changed their tune.”

The Addus executives said the ongoing pandemic is continuing to exacerbate the workforce shortage, with a dearth of registered nurses creating bottlenecks in the home healthcare and hospice divisions.