The Latest AARP Nursing Home Dashboard Sees Positive Signs For Wyoming

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AARP’s COVID-19 Nursing Home Dashboard shows improving trends among Wyoming nursing home staff and residents in numbers of both Nursing Home Deaths and cases of COVID-19 over the four-week period ending Aug. 22.

During the four-week period ending Aug. 22, there were no COVID-19-related deaths among nursing home residents in Wyoming. That is a drop from four deaths during the previous four week period, which led to a state ratio of .20 COVID-19 deaths per 100 nursing home residents, the highest ratio in the country over the four-week period ending July 18.

Wyoming’s number of nursing home resident cases of COVID-19 per 100 residents remained relatively flat, going from six over the four-week period ending July 18 to seven in the four week period ending Aug. 22. 

Wyoming’s percentage of nursing home staff who are fully vaccinated is 53%, below the US average of 63.5%. Wyoming’s vaccination rate in healthcare workers ranks it 42nd in the nation. Hawaii is reporting 89.4% of its healthcare workers as fully vaccinated, while Louisiana has the nation’s lowest level of healthcare vaccination at 47.9%. Nationally, there were modest increases in vaccination rates of nursing home staff in this four-week period, with 84% of residents and 64% of staff fully vaccinated as of August 22 (up from 82% and 60% in mid-July).

Wyoming also ranks lower than the national average in the area of nursing home staffing shortages, as 39.4% of nursing homes in the state reported a shortage of nurses or aides. That is up from 37.1% for the previous four-week period and reflects national trends. Washington State has the nation’s highest percentage of facilities reporting a shortage of nurses and aides with 56% of its facilities experiencing shortages. 

While vaccine adoption among nursing home staff is relatively low in Wyoming, 89.1% of the state’s nursing home residents have been vaccinated as of Aug. 22, the 13th highest rate in the country and well above the national average of 83.7%. 

National Trends

Mirroring a surge in new COVID-19 cases in the community, the rates of new cases among nursing home residents and staff, as well as staffing shortages, have risen to the highest levels since the winter across the nation.

In the four weeks ending August 22, there were 1.2 new resident cases and 1.95 new staff cases for every 100 nursing home residents, roughly six times the rate from the last dashboard (four weeks ending July 18) and are the highest recorded since the four-week period ending February 14. COVID-19 deaths are also surging in nursing homes, tripling from about 1 out of every 3000 residents in the four weeks ending July 18 to about 1 out of every 1000 residents in the four weeks ending August 22.

Cases are concentrated among the unvaccinated: residents who are not fully vaccinated were three times as likely to contract COVID-19 last month as those that are fully vaccinated. Assuming a similar relative risk exists for staff, the adjusted rate of cases for unvaccinated residents and staff were 2.7 and 3.4 per 100 residents, respectively. The Nursing Home Dashboard tracked five separate four-week periods from June 1, 2020 to October 18, 2020. During this time, the rate of new resident cases ranged from 2.5 to 3.4 per 100 residents, and the rate of new staff cases from 2.3 to 3.6 per 100 residents. In August 2021, unvaccinated staff and residents are as likely to contract COVID-19 as they were in summer 2020.  

The percentage of nursing homes reporting a shortage of nurses or aides jumped 3 percentage points to 27%, the highest since the four weeks ending January 17, and by far the largest month-to-month increase since CMS began tracking last spring. Vaccination rates continued to tick upwards slowly, with 84 percent of residents and 64 percent of staff now fully vaccinated as of August 22.

About the Dashboard

The AARP Nursing Home COVID-19 Dashboard analyzes federally reported data in four-week periods going back to June 1, 2020. Using this data, the AARP Public Policy Institute, in collaboration with the Scripps Gerontology Center at Miami University in Ohio, created the dashboard to provide snapshots of the virus’ infiltration into nursing homes and impact on nursing home residents and staff, with the goal of identifying specific areas of concern at the national and state levels in a timely manner.

About AARP

AARP is the nation’s largest nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to empowering people 50 and older to choose how they live as they age. With a nationwide presence and nearly 38 million members, AARP strengthens communities and advocates for what matters most to families: health security, financial stability and personal fulfillment. AARP also produces the nation's largest circulation publications: AARP The Magazine and AARP Bulletin. To learn more, visit www.aarp.org, www.aarp.org/espanol or follow @AARP, @AARPenEspanol and @AARPadvocates, @AliadosAdelante on social media.