Bleeping Computer: Florida hospital takes IT systems offline after cyberattack. “Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare (TMH) has taken its IT systems offline and suspended non-emergency procedures following a late Thursday cyberattack. While all its network systems were taken online, TMH says this attack only impacted some of them.”
CMS: HHS Releases New Data and Report on Hospital and Nursing Home Ownership. “The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is releasing data publicly — for the first time — on mergers, acquisitions, consolidations, and changes of ownership from 2016-2022 for hospitals and nursing homes enrolled in Medicare…. HHS’s Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) is also releasing a related report — an analysis of the new CMS data examining trends in changes of ownership over the past six years.”
PR Newswire: Understanding Hospital Costs– New Tool Makes Data More Transparent and Accessible (PRESS RELEASE). “The [Hospital Cost Tool] identifies different cost measures including hospital revenue, cost to charge ratios, and profitability across more than 4,600 hospitals nationwide from 2011 through 2019. It is interactive, allowing users to examine data for an individual hospital or specific health system, by state or users can compare data across hospitals and states. The tool is based on NASHP’s Hospital Cost Calculator that uses Medicare Cost Report data annually submitted to the federal government by hospitals. Data for 2020 will be added to the tool after more hospitals have completed their reports for that year.”
NBC News: U.S. Covid hospitalizations hit new low, falling 32 percent in the last two weeks. “Covid hospitalizations are at their lowest levels since the U.S. began keeping records at the start of the pandemic, according to an NBC News analysis of data from the Department of Health and Human Services. Average hospitalizations fell to 16,760, lower than the previous low of 16,808, set before the delta wave in June.”
New York Times: Outbreak at Shanghai Hospital Exposes Covid’s Risks to China’s Seniors. “A coronavirus outbreak is ravaging a hospital in Shanghai for older adults, underscoring the difficulties officials have had in containing infections even as the city imposed a 10-day staggered lockdown.”
Politico: CDC updates Covid-19 guidance to allow patients wear N95s. “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday updated its guidance so that people visiting health care facilities are allowed to wear highly protective masks such as N95s. The change comes after a POLITICO report last week found that hospitals around the country routinely ask patients and visitors to wear a surgical mask instead of their own N95.”
Politico: The South’s health care system is crumbling under Covid-19. Enter Tennessee.. “Of the 50 counties with the highest Covid deaths per capita, 24 are within 40 miles of a hospital that has closed, according to a POLITICO analysis in late January. Nearly all 50 counties were in rural areas. Rural hospital closures have been accelerating, with 181 since 2005 — and over half of those happening since 2015, according to data from the University of North Carolina. But that may be just the beginning. Over 450 rural hospitals are at risk of closure, according to an analysis by the Chartis Group, one of the nation’s largest independent health care advisory firms.”
Politico: Some hospitals ask patients, visitors to remove N95s, citing CDC. “They fear that surgical masks put the most vulnerable people at higher risk of catching Covid-19. N95s, which seal tighter to the face, offer better protection against the airborne virus, studies show. For more than a year, many have called on the Biden administration to change its guidance to offer more protection inside hospitals, even as mitigation measures have been dialed back and case counts decline. And yet, patients across the country say they are often told to replace their N95s with surgical masks as they enter hospitals.”
World Health Organization: WHO Global Health Facilities Database: Ensuring access to primary healthcare and UHC. “The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed urgent gaps in countries’ current ability to locate health facilities, impeding progress to provide equitable access to therapeutics, diagnostics, and vaccinations through the ACT-Accelerator and other initiatives. As a standardized and open access repository of health facility information, the database will provide critical insights to deliver primary health care, especially during emergencies. It will also leverage the power of geospatial data to map health facilities in relation to communities and help bridge long-standing inequalities in access and use.”
Vox: Maternity wards are shuttering across the US during the pandemic. “Across the country, from suburban San Diego to rural Connecticut, maternity wards have been shutting down for good during the Covid-19 pandemic. This wave of closures has been building for years, but it appears to be accelerating during the pandemic. It could make birth even more dangerous in the US, which already sees far more deaths per capita among infants and pregnant women than comparably wealthy countries.”
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette: Number of Arkansans hospitalized with covid drops below 400 for first time since November. “The number of Arkansans hospitalized with covid-19 dropped below 400 Saturday for the first time since Nov. 29, 2021, shortly before the surge of the omicron variant, according to data from the Arkansas Department of Health. After a slight increase Friday, the number of hospitalizations fell by 41 to 371. Covid-19 patients in intensive care also decreased Saturday after increasing Friday. The new total of 121 intensive care patients is the lowest level since Nov. 18, according to Health Department data.”
Salt Lake Tribune: Utah reports about 3,500 new COVID-19 cases as hospitalizations rise . “There were 196 COVID patients in intensive care units statewide as of Thursday, an increase from Wednesday. ICUs in the state’s larger “referral” hospitals were at 96.1 % capacity, up sharply from Wednesday and again exceeding the 85% threshold that hospital administrators have said is necessary to leave room for unpredictable staffing levels, new patients and availability of specialized equipment and personnel.”
New York Daily News: COVID hospitalizations drop in New York as state emerges from winter surge. “The number of New Yorkers hospitalized with COVID is falling fast, dropping by 25% from last week alone, Gov. Hochul announced on Tuesday. The governor provided a brief update on the state’s fight against coronavirus during an appearance at the State Fairgrounds in Syracuse, used as a testing and vaccination site throughout the pandemic.”
New York Times: A Shrinking Band of Southern Nurses, Neck-Deep in Another Covid Wave. “Even as new cases peak and begin to decline in the Northeast and Upper Midwest, the nation’s hospitals are still confronting a crushing influx of patients. In Mississippi, the latest wave of infections has pushed nearly all of the state’s acute-care hospitals to capacity.”
Washington Post: Low-wage workers prop up the nursing home industry. They’re quitting in droves.. “In the eight years she has worked at nursing homes, LaToya Francis, 34, has been yelled at, kicked at and had feces thrown at her for little more than the minimum wage. She endured it because she loved being a certified nursing assistant, she said. But she’s not sure she can hold out much longer.”
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