Trump Administration Issues New Rules For Coronavirus Testing, Reporting; Hospitals Protest ‘Heavy Handed’ Regulation

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Coverage By Soumyadeep Pal

August 26, 2020

TOPLINE

Threatening fines and withheld funding, the Trump administration issued rules Tuesday requiring nursing homes to ramp up coronavirus testing and for hospitals to report case data to the government, bringing immediate pushback from the American Hospital Association for a president who frequently hails himself as a historic slasher of government regulations.

WASHINGTON, DC – APRIL 19: US President Donald Trump listens to Seema Verma, Administrator of the … [+] Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services speak at the daily coronavirus briefing at the White House on April 19, 2020 in Washington, DC. New York state will begin the nation’s most aggressive COVID-19 antibody testing campaign this week even as some states begin to loosen restrictions amid pressure to restart the economy. (Photo by Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)

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KEY FACTS

The administration had previously made Covid-19 data reporting optional for hospitals, with Vice President Mike Pence requesting “daily data reports on testing, capacity and utilization” in a letter to hospital administrators in March.

But in sweeping changes announced Tuesday by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the administration is now requiring hospitals to report that data in addition to requiring nursing homes to test staff and offer residents testing as well.

“Reporting of test results and other data are vitally important tools for controlling the spread of the virus and give providers on the front lines what they need to fight it,” CMS Administrator Seema Verma said in a statement.

As an enforcement mechanism, the administration is making reporting a requirement to receive Medicare and Medicaid funding, asserting, “This reporting is needed to support broader surveillance of COVID-19.”

The new rule came under fire from the American Hospital Association, whose CEO Rick Pollack released a statement calling it a “heavy-handed regulatory approach” and a “disturbing move.”

Pollack claimed the move was made “without consultation” or the opportunity to provide feedback.

Key Background

Pollack’s criticism carries a tinge of irony for Trump, who frequently touts his bona fides as an opponent of government regulations. “Before I came into office, American workers were smothered by a merciless avalanche of wasteful and expensive and intrusive federal regulation,” Trump said in a speech in July, claiming to have terminated eight regulations for every new one issue and removed “nearly 25,000 pages of job-destroying regulations.”

Chief Critic

“Hospitals and health systems consistently have put forward a good faith effort to report the data needed to battle COVID-19 under very trying circumstances, despite the ever-changing requests from the government on data reporting,” Pollack said in his statement, arguing that the new move could “jeopardize access to care and leave patients and communities without vital health services from their local hospital during a pandemic.”

Big Number

18.5%. That’s the deficit in the electorate’s approval of Trump’s handling of coronavirus in the RealClearPolitics average, with 58.5% approval and 40% disapproval.

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