CDC recently updated their dashboard of COVID vax booster rates among nursing home staff & residents: Nursing Home COVID-19 Vaccination Data Dashboard | NHSN | CDC (arguably the most important population groups to be vaccinated).
Arizona has the lowest nursing home resident COVID booster vaccination rate in the entire country (8.3%) – much lower than even the deep south and West Virginia. Same goes for nursing home staff (1.2%) – although the vax rates for staff are bad throughout the whole country.
The intervention? The ADHS licensing rules we published in 2014 require nursing homes to offer in house influenza and pneumonia vaccines to their residents/patients at least once per year [AAC R9-10-413(5)] – however ADHS never updated their licensing rules to require facilities offer the COVID vaccine or its boosters annually.
BTW: that could have been (and could still be) fixed by a licensing rule change – wouldn’t need legislation.
