Spotlight PA: At last minute, Pa. lawmakers vote to extend dozens of COVID-19 waivers

This article was originally published on Spotlight PA.

by Danielle Ohl of Spotlight PA | Sept. 29, 2021

📷 FRED ADAMS / FOR SPOTLIGHT PA

HARRISBURG — The Pennsylvania legislature unanimously voted Wednesday to extend dozens of regulatory waivers put into place last year to help health-care providers fight COVID-19.

Without action, the waivers would have expired Thursday, potentially exacerbating ongoing staffing crises in hospitals and long-term care institutions, which are again facing rising COVID-19 cases. Health-care workers and their advocates had warned any lapse in the relaxed rules would have renewed administrative burdens and made fighting the ongoing pandemic more difficult.

Wednesday’s action will keep the waivers in place until March 2022 while the legislature considers a number of bills that would make the regulatory suspensions permanent. Gov. Tom Wolf will sign the bill.

“The governor is thankful the legislature engaged the administration and stakeholders and ultimately agreed with most of the administration’s recommendations on extending COVID-19-related waivers that are still in use,” spokesperson Lyndsay Kensinger said.

At the beginning of the pandemic, Wolf approved nearly 100 waivers to ease some of the rules governing health-care workers and ensure as many professionals as possible were on the ground in hospitals, vaccination clinics, and long-term care facilities.

The temporary changes were made under a disaster declaration that later became a target for legislative Republicans unhappy with the administration’s business closures.

Buoyed by two successful constitutional amendments that curtailed the executive’s power, the GOP-controlled General Assembly ended Wolf’s emergency order in June, while allowing the waivers to remain in place until Sept. 30.

Under the bill passed Wednesday, all suspensions under the Department of Health, Department of Human Services, and the Bureau of Professional and Occupational Affairs will remain in place until March unless Wolf and the agencies decide to terminate them sooner.

Among the waivers extended are those allowing out-of-state practitioners to treat patients in Pennsylvania, permitting retired or lapsed professionals to return to medicine, and expanding who can give a vaccine.

The waivers also allow patients to access care via telemedicine, which as of now is neither allowed nor prohibited in Pennsylvania law, creating a gray area for health-care providers and insurance companies.

Lawmakers have introduced bills in both the House and Senate to provide rules and regulations surrounding telemedicine, but past efforts have broken down over partisan disagreements. Wolf vetoed a telemedicine bill last year because it would have prevented health-care providers from prescribing abortion-inducing medicine.

As a number of other bills that would make regulatory suspensions permanent await consideration, two removing administrative barriers for physician assistants passed Wednesday.

The Joint State Government Commission is studying the impact of the waivers and which should stay in place to remove barriers to employment in the state. Glenn Pasewicz, executive director of the committee, said a report should be out by late October.

Separately, lawmakers on Wednesday directed various state agencies to post a report listing which waivers were and were not extended by Nov. 1.

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I Can See Clearly Now

By Sarah Robison

I Can See Clearly Now

“…the rain is gone. I can see allllllll obstacles in my way! Gone are the daaaark clouds that had me blind. It’s gonna be a bright, BRIGHT sun shiny day…”, Wallflower and I belted out the Johnny Nash hit on our ascent of Little Haystack Mountain, the 1st of the 3 peaks along Franconia Ridge. This ridgeline mystically arches its spine above tree line for 3 miles lending to the most sought after, and undoubtedly the most iconic, 360 degree views in the White Mountains. Not being one for hiking (I know, I know…), I am most anticipatory of the smell of exhaust fumes. This means that I’m within arm’s reach of town. Of an anchovy pie. Of ginger ale. Of electricity. This said, I’ve dreamt of ambling along this winding pavé since I had learned of the existence of the Appalachian Trail and one’s ability to hike thru. I had studied the reels of YouTubers documenting their time on this very ridge as I contemplated my own attempt. The thought of me, ME, Sarah Elizabeth Robison, having resigned from my earning potential, living outdoors for upwards of 6 months, nearly walking the entire length of the Eastern Seaboard, to find myself walking this line? Huh uh. Not a chance in hell. No way. Yes way. On September 9th, I found myself at mile 1822.9 of my very own Northbound thru hike of the Appalachian Trail at the mouth of the Franconia Ridge. With a visibility of 6 feet. At best. Damn. The fog was so dense that we were going to have difficulty maintaining our sense of direction, let alone seeing the Presidentials or the Kinsmans. Control what you can and accept what you can’t, I repeated over and over with internal dialogue. Similar to what a bride must do when her garden wedding meets a tropical storm. I was wearing my disappointment, but fictional future plans to return to the Ridge next season began to dance in my head.

READ MORE ON SARAH'S BLOG

State Regulatory Waivers That Helped Hospitals, Health Care Providers During Pandemic Set To Expire

Published September 16, 2021 at 9:15 AM EDT

🎧 LISTEN • 22:30

📸: Jae C. Hong / AP

On today’s program: We hear how waivers that provided more flexibility and eased administrative burdens helped medical facilities face the pandemic, but they’re set to expire later this month; an obstetrician-gynecologist explains why a new bereavement leave policy for city employees will help those facing pregnancy loss; and a conversation about the increasing mental health needs of children and teenagers in the pandemic.

Medical waivers that lowered administrative barriers for health care workers set to expire (0:00 - 8:14)

Last year in the early weeks and months of the pandemic, hospitals and health care providers were swamped with patients who contracted COVID-19. Gov. Tom Wolf approved waivers to keep medical workers on the job and help bring in others, but those waivers are set to expire on Sept. 30.

“They were supposed to give a little bit of flexibility to people … [whose] jobs were upended or they were on the frontlines of fighting COVID,” says Danielle Ohl, a reporter with Spotlight PA.

One example of how these waivers worked is nurses or doctors with lapsed licenses could return to work in facilities, removing some administrative barriers.

Nearly 100 such waivers were implemented, however, Ohl says there isn’t good data on how many people used them.

Should the waivers not be extended, Ohl says boards that govern professions with waivers will be overwhelmed.

“In the most dire case, a nurse could be pulled off the floor because their paperwork didn’t go through or it expired,” says Ohl. “There is just a fear that the administrative burden isn’t going to be dealt with and they don’t really know what that means, and they don’t want to take a chance in breaking the law.”

Ohl says the legislature could extend the waivers, but it’s unclear if that will happen while the legislature is currently out of session.