With 98% of live-in occupants now fully vaccinated against COVID-19, Middleton Senior Living staff, residents and their families are asking why they are still forced to conform to strict visitation rules imposed on such facilities about a year ago.
On Monday morning, Congressman Troy Balderson, R-Zanesville, who represents the 12th Congressional District, visited Middleton in Licking County to listen to administrators, family members, and residents share the stories of frustration and loneliness amid present pandemic precautions imposed upon congregate care facilities.
Such facilities have been particularly hard hit across the nation, with COVID-19 infections sweeping through the ranks of staff and residents -- the latter a particularly vulnerable population owning to age and frequent underlying health conditions.
"It's been a hard year," Middleton Executive Director Debbie Hartshorn said. "It would be nice to have some hope again."
Middleton has lost 16 residents to COVID-19, she said. Presently, the facility has 148 residents, 98% of whom have been fully vaccinated against the virus. About 47% of the staff has been vaccinated.
Yet there is frustration among seniors and their families regarding the rules still imposed upon care and retirement homes such as Middleton despite nearly all of its senior population now being inoculated against COVID.
"It's been one year since these facilities were locked down due to COVID," a masked Balderson said, speaking to media from the canopied entryway outside Middleton. His remarks were also broadcast inside the facility. "We need to acknowledge the resilience of the residents and those that care for them."
Balderson said staff members who have cared for residents have become friends and even akin to family of residents under the past year's harrowing conditions. He described them holding hands, praying with and helping elderly residents Facetime with family.
"They are the heroes who have been on the frontline of the COVID crisis this past year," the congressman said. "We are so grateful to them."
Meanwhile, Balderson said, "We have flattened the curve and now thousands of Ohioans are getting vaccinated at an accelerating pace..."
He continued, "For nearly a year now," residents such as those in Middleton "have been locked down. For weeks on end, they have faced isolation and loneliness. They have been forced to schedule appointments to simply have a visitor... What's worse is, we keeping moving the goalposts on them. These folks are still waiting."
Balderson thanked Gov. Mike DeWine for his leadership "in these unprecedented times" and said he and his staff have been in discussions with the governor regarding visitor restrictions placed on Ohio's long-term health care facilities.
Monday's press conference and exchange with residents and families was aimed at putting faces and stories to those calling for easing of visitor restrictions under present COVID conditions.
Kathy Wilkins' mother has been in Middleton for four years. Her mother, Wilkins said, will turn 99 this year and has lost friends to COVID-19 within the facility. Wilkins spoke of the sense of perceived abandonment felt by residents who don't understand why their access to friends and family remains so limited.
Wilkins also spoke of the toll exacted on elderly residents deprived stimulation and engagement: "We've seen Mom's cognition drop significantly since we haven't been able to see her... It is heartbreaking in a lot of different ways."
Mae Pound said of her own mother who is a Middleton resident, that loneliness and isolation is a health threat all its own. She said her mother spoke of potentially dying not from COVID, but of loneliness.
Wilkins told Balderson and others, "I'm hoping Gov. DeWine will look at this...I'm hoping he will take another look at the congregate care situation."
Hartshorn said, "We've lost loved ones here. One life is too many. I think we just want answers at this point and the silence has been deafening."
Ironically, as his Middleton visit was near wrapping up, Balderson announced that the Center for Disease Control had at nearly that same moment just issued new guidelines for some visitations for those who have been vaccinated, but he also said he and his staff would need to study those newly-emerging guidelines more closely before commenting further.
