February 15, 2021
This year I chair the Senate Ways and Means Committee which produces the Senate budget for the next fiscal year. This week the Senate Ways and Means Committee had Dr. Lee Norman, head of the state health department give a report to our committee on vaccinations in Kansas. The committee questioned Dr. Norman as to when nursing homes and long term care facilities might start easing visitor restrictions. Dr. Norman reported 83% of the residents have received a first dose and 53% a second dose, with some turning down the vaccination, at least for now. He also reported that 56% of staff have agreed to take the vaccine.
Dr. Norman reported that all 650 nursing homes under CMS oversight had received vaccinations and others not under CMS were called orphan facilities and all known orphan facilities had received the vaccinations. He did say they had found one facility that they did not know about and had plans to get these people vaccinated. He said the push to vaccinate has led a lot of hospitals and some nursing homes to begin easing the visitor restrictions, with some allowing one visitor. Dr. Norman reported during the peak of the pandemic visitors were often limited to those who were dying.
Quoting Dr. Norman, “We are working a strategy with what is called rapid antigen testing where the unvaccinated person can have a rapid antigen test at the time that they come in to visit a loved one.”
We also had an update from the Kansas Department of Labor.
They reported on the special 11 -week extension to pandemic unemployment insurance benefits built into December’s federal stimulus act is weeks away from implementation in Kansas. This means many workers will go 2 months or longer without unemployment payments. Many Kansans are waiting on the Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC) program. Kansas Department of Labor is working to get the payments out.
I continue to work daily to get unemployed Kansans their unemployment benefits. As I have stated in the past the Kansas Department of Labor must do a better job taking care of unemployed Kansans.
It is an honor and pleasure to serve the 40th Senate District of Kansas. Please do not hesitate to contact me by e-mail at [email protected]. You may also call me with your questions or concerns. My office number is 785-296-7399, or my cell number is 785-899-4700.
Rick Billinger, R-Goodland, is state senator of the Kansas 40th Dist.