Insights
Paula Sanders Discusses Federal Court's Halt of CMS Vaccine Rule with Report on Medicare Compliance
In the December 6, 2021 article, "Courts Halt CMS Vaccine Rule, But ‘It’s a Very Fluid Situation’" by Nina Youngstrom in Report on Medicare Compliance, Paula G. Sanders provides insight into the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Service (CMS) vaccine mandate and a federal court's recent blocking of enforcement of the mandate.
Ms. Sanders notes:
“I think portions of the rule will be struck down and the mandate for nursing facilities will continue. The mandate would have a better shot at success if CMS had limited it to nursing homes, an opinion based on language in the federal judge’s decision in Missouri. The judge stated that 'CMS lacks evidence showing that vaccination status has a direct impact on spreading COVID in the mandate’s covered healthcare facilities'. CMS acknowledges its lack of ‘comprehensive data’ on this matter but attempts to ‘extrapolate’ the abundant data that it does have on Long Term Care Facilities (‘LTCs’), generally referred to as nursing homes, to the other dozen-plus Medicare and Medicaid facilities covered by the mandate.”