BEAVER, Pa. — Beaver County leaders hope one zip code that’s a hot spot for COVID-19 cases won’t hold the county back from reopening.
That zip code includes Brighton Rehabilitation, a nursing home Channel 11 has been telling you about for weeks.
The sign outside of the facility may say Brighton Strong, but it’s what’s happening inside that the community and several leaders are worried about.
The numbers announced for Beaver County on Wednesday were 392 positive cases, 2,007 negative and 65 deaths -- and of those deaths, 58 are from nursing homes.
According to a statement by Brighton Rehab, approximately 250 residents and staff members have had coronavirus. The statement went on to say that of those affected, “a percentage have passed after being diagnosed. It should be understood that some of these people passed from non-Covid related illnesses, or natural causes.” (Read the full statement below)
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Consider this: Beaver County’s total number of cases is 392. Sixty-five people have died, an increase of six since Tuesday.
So, about 64% of the county’s cases have come from that one nursing home.
Many want to know if those six new deaths happened at the nursing home.
Brighton Rehab isn’t releasing numbers and the state isn’t giving specifics either.
“Brighton Rehab needs to come forward and be very transparent and the Department of Health needs to mandate that they do so the department can do that step up to the plate and do so,” said state Rep. Aaron Bernstein.
During her daily update on the pandemic, the Pennsylvania Secretary of Health, Dr. Rachel Levine, wouldn’t get specific on death locations.
“I can’t confirm the specific location been extremely challenging. Doing everything, contracting consulting, giving personal protective equipment more than daily phone calls. Doing everything we can to protect the vulnerable residents and staff,” Levine said.
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Brighton Rehab said it’s doing the same, and released its first statement in weeks about COVID-19 cases, saying:
“In the last two months, the number of staff and residents at Brighton is approximately a thousand people. Approximately 75% of those people have seemingly been unaffected by Covid19. Of the 25% who were affected, a percentage have passed after being diagnosed. It should be understood that some of these people passed from non-Covid related illnesses, or natural causes. Once a person is diagnosed, the death is mis-recorded as a Covid death, even when Covid played no role. Some residents who passed were on hospice care. Others passed due to Covid19, but might have been saved had they not had advanced directives prohibiting life-saving measures, and in some cases life-sustaining treatment. Conversely, there is a large group of residents who were diagnosed as Covid+, that have now seemingly fully recovered, and returned to baseline. The number who have recovered well exceeds fifty, and many more are on their way to recovery.
While Brighton is larger than most of the facilities in Pennsylvania and in the Country, the situation at Brighton is unfortunately far from unique. The Covid virus has proven, particularly in communal environments, to be exceedingly virulent; sweeping through cruise ships, Cities, healthcare facilities, and social gatherings throughout the world.
Every day, our professional and dedicated staff, work tirelessly to slow the rate of transmission, and to care for our wonderful residents. It is time that all people, particularly those with Political power, stand shoulder-to-shoulder with those on the front lines, to provide testing, resources, treatment options, and coordinated action between different levels of government and healthcare providers.
From the first positive case, we have been in constant communication with the department of health, and the department’s epidemiologists. That has given crucial direction as to when to test, where to treat residents, and use of personal protective equipment. We took steps to prevent the introduction and spread well before the first documented case. What we have learned is that it will take scientists, doctors, government, hospitals, nursing homes, and other providers getting together, sharing information and resources in an efficient manner, and for us all to stop the blame game.”
Sen. Pat Toomey, who’s been very outspoken on this facility, tell Channel 11 the details of what is transpiring at the facility are grim.
He gave the following statement:
“The details of what is transpiring at Brighton’s facility in Beaver County are grim. Many nursing homes face extreme challenges in controlling the spread of COVID-19 infection, but for those like Brighton, whose documented histories of poor performance would qualify them as a Special Focus Facility, heightened safeguards should have been implemented in the weeks leading up to the outbreak.”
The Health Department also provided the following statement:
"The department has been working with facilities that have seen significant outbreaks, including Brighton, as part of the work being done to assist nursing homes with outbreaks. Some of this work is being done by the department, some by ECRI, who we have contracted with, and some by other organizations.
These situations are not easy for anyone, and we know congregate care settings have been hit particularly hard, as evident by the data on our website. The department does not believe that there were any serious red flags about the way Brighton has responded to the COVID-19 cases seen at the facility.
Brighton brought in a new administrator earlier this year to work through some of the issues that occurred over the past few years.
We are in regular contact with all Pennsylvania nursing homes, including Brighton Rehabilitation and Wellness Center, and filling their requests for supplies of personal protection equipment for staff to care for patients.
We have been working to push personal protective equipment to all of our long-term care facilities in Pennsylvania and sent that equipment to facilities earlier this month. We have also been in constant communication with facilities of concern to assist them and check to see what potential needs they have, including PPE.
The state has pushed out to all healthcare facilities, including nursing homes, nearly 3 million N95 masks, more than 238,000 gowns, close to 1.38 million procedure masks, more than 1.34 million gloves, more than 73,000 face shields, and more than 5,600 coveralls.
There has been guidance shared with all nursing home facilities in Pennsylvania to assist them with COVID-19. In addition, we are sharing all of our COVID-19 related materials with them.
Individuals who are in congregate care settings, such as nursing homes and the workers taking care of them, are among those prioritized by the department and many testing locations across the state.
The department is also working with our contractor, ECRI, who is assisting long-term care facilities that have significant issues. This includes assisting with PPE consultation, what the needs of the facilities are, etc. ECRI has worked with more than 70 facilities as part of the contract.
The 50 new cases per 100,000 population metric is just one metric being considered, and not meeting that threshold does not mean the others will not be considered. For example, we know there are some counties struggling with what is occurring in long-term care facilities, but the rest of the county has seen only a handful of cases. While those long-term care facility employees do need to be in the community, all of these things will be looked at. This will include testing capacity, hospital bed availability, the Carnegie-Mellon modeling, PPE availability among facilities, and other factors.
Although, neither the state or Brighton Rehab will say how many residents have died at the facility, Levine did say that might happen in the near future."
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