CDC Not Counting Vaccine Breakthrough Cases, So How They Know These Workers Were Unvaccinated?

NYTimes |  In late spring, the 142 nursing homes operated by the Good Samaritan Society hit a milestone that was unthinkable just four months earlier: Zero cases of Covid-19 across the whole company, from 900 at the peak of the pandemic.

The relief was short-lived.

The case count has ticked up again: It’s still below 100 among residents and staff, the company said, but includes many breakthrough cases of vaccinated residents testing positive. Then last week, two vaccinated residents died with Covid at the Good Samaritan Society-Deuel County nursing home in Clear Lake, South Dakota.

The company said it had pinpointed the cause of the spread there and at other of its facilities: The breakthroughs had happened in the same homes where unvaccinated staff were testing positive, seemingly carrying the virus into the home from the community.

“We fought this virus, and we were winning with the vaccine,” said Randy Bury, chief executive of the Good Samaritan Society, a nonprofit chain that operates in 24 states.

Late last month, the company became one of the largest long-term care chains in the country to order mandatory vaccines for staff, highlighting turmoil within an industry desperate to avoid a repeat of the devastation that swept through this highly vulnerable population.

After sharp drops in infections over the last several months, the number of Covid cases among U.S. nursing-home residents and staff roughly tripled from the week of July 4 to the week ending July 25, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The agency’s data show that cases of Covid among residents had risen to 1,312, the highest figure reported since early March.

About 133,000 nursing home residents died of Covid over the course of the pandemic, although the death rate has plummeted in recent months with more than 80 percent of residents now vaccinated. Overall, Covid deaths among nursing home residents and staff members accounted for nearly one-third of the nation’s pandemic fatalities.

Growing calls for vaccine mandates among health care workers have gained urgency but also met resistance in the nursing home industry, where some homes say it will cost them staff members in an industry already plagued with high turnover. Only about 60 percent of nursing home staff members are vaccinated, and some states report an even lower rate, with less than half inoculated, according to the most recent government data.

As of the week ending July 25, Covid cases among nursing home staff members nationwide were also climbing, to 2,145, according to the C.D.C. data.