Medical Debt Remains On Credit Reports After Biden-Era Rule Tossed by Judge; Shared Rooms Helped Fuel COVID-19 Deaths in Nursing Homes. Are a Million Private Rooms Possible? and other C-Virus related stories

Craig Hudson, REUTERS

Medical debt remains on credit reports after Biden-era rule tossed by judge:

Consumers were dealt a blow after a federal judge in Texas tossed out a Biden-era rule that would have banned the inclusion of medical debt on credit reports.

In a move that advocates told USA TODAY eliminates a vital consumer protection, U.S. District Judge Sean Jordan on July 11 granted a request from President Donald Trump's administration and two financial industry groups to vacate the medical debt rule.

The medical debt rule, finalized in January before former President Joe Biden left office, would've banned medical debt on credit reports and prohibited lenders from using a person's medical debt history to make lending decisions.

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The rule was scheduled to take effect in March, but the two trade groups sued the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to halt the rule, and Jordan issued a stay, delaying the rule's start date. In late April, the Trump-appointed CFPB leadership opted not to oppose the lawsuit and filed a joint motion with the financial industry groups – the Consumer Data Industry Association and Cornerstone Credit Union League – to ask the judge to vacate the medical debt rule.

Jordan, appointed during Trump's first administration, agreed with the trade groups that it was "fair, adequate and reasonable" to vacate the medical debt rule because it exceeded the CFPB's authority under the Fair Credit Reporting Act.

Medical debt 'will likely get worse' --->READ MORE HERE

ALYSSA POINTER

Shared Rooms Helped Fuel COVID-19 Deaths in Nursing Homes. Are a Million Private Rooms Possible?

David Waters can’t wait for the $37.5 million overhaul of his nursing home, in Cobb County, Georgia, to be finished. The project will bring a new therapy garden to the campus, where he’ll be able to work on his beloved jade succulents. “It’s gonna be gorgeous,” the 67-year-old, clad in a bright tie-dye T-shirt and surgical mask to protect from COVID-19, said in a recent Zoom call.

Fellow resident Carolyn Gibson, 83, also on the call, heard that the new common areas have been designed by a residential architect to resemble living rooms. “That just sounds wonderful,” she said, nodding, her big gold earrings waving to and fro.

But there’s one change coming to the 130-bed A.G. Rhodes senior care facility, just outside of Atlanta, that lights up residents’ eyes like no other: private rooms. When construction is finished later this year, the facility’s shared two-bedrooms will be replaced by 58 private rooms. And a brand-new building will boast 72 more private rooms for memory care patients.

Shared rooms will be relics of the past.

“The privacy – I’d just love that,” says Gibson, who currently has a roommate. “I could turn up my television as loud as I want, put things on the walls … I would just be able to make it my own little cocoon.”

“One person per room?” says Waters, who also has a roommate. “Sign me up!”

It’s a feeling shared by many of the nation’s 1.2 million nursing home residents and their loved ones, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic. The virus has killed more than 163,000 nursing home residents, according to government data – likely an undercount. Shared rooms helped enable COVID’s wildfire-like spread through the facilities.

As a result, private rooms for residents are part of President Joe Biden’s sweeping plan to improve the nation’s 15,000 nursing homes, announced early last year. A growing body of evidence shows that private rooms not only help prevent infections from spreading, but that they also lead to better overall health and satisfaction among residents. Biden’s plan instructs the federal government to explore “ways to accelerate phasing out rooms with three or more residents and to promote single-occupancy rooms.”

But implementing such a vision could take decades, if it happens at all. Most U.S. nursing home residents currently live in shared rooms, with two to four residents and a shared bathroom. So while some nursing homes, like the nonprofit A.G. Rhodes, are helping deliver on Biden’s goal, many in the industry say widespread adoption of private rooms would require huge shifts in how facilities are configured, financed, regulated and run. Nursing home operators, resident advocates and industry experts say the federal government would need to do much more to drive a revolution in how residents are housed.

“Our nursing home model doesn’t support private rooms at all right now,” says Sheryl Zimmerman, co-director of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Program on Aging, Disability and Long-Term Care. “Radical changes are going to have to happen if we want to see more.”

Old buildings, outdated care --->READ MORE HERE

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