National Guard Aids NJ Nursing Homes Amid COVID Spike

SUSSEX COUNTY, NJ — With a recent spike in COVID cases within Sussex County’s nursing homes, the state plans to send the National Guard back to facilities to help.

As of Jan. 5, the County of Sussex reported 555 new cases among Sussex County residents. The county's last long-term care facility positive case breakdown from Dec. 23, showed two COVID-related resident deaths at Woodland Behavioral and Nursing Center, with 52 cases among residents and staff. There were 28 residents who tested positive in the 543-bed facility, with 24 among the 475 total employees.

Anthony Fasano, who became the Sussex County Board of County Commissioners' Director at their Wednesday night reorganization meeting told Patch on Thursday that the National Guard is expected to arrive on Jan. 10, to assist with sanitizing and other tasks the staff needs help with.

"The big takeaway over these last few days have been all sides coming together for the common good," Fasano said. "The State Department of Health, the County Division of Health and the facility."

"The Commissioners commend all who were involved in these efforts and we remain committed to taking every necessary step to ensure Sussex County residents are getting the best care possible," he added.

At other facilities within the county, Homestead Rehabilitation and Healthcare also had one COVID related fatality on the Dec. 23 report and 16 cases total in the 128-bed facility, with eight residents and eight of the 133 total staff.

Though Chelsea at Sparta, Bristol Glen and Barn Hill Care Center reported no deaths on Dec. 23, they each had one COVID-positive resident, with 4 employees at Chelsea, 8 at Bristol Glen and 7 at Barn Hill, having tested positive.

Sussex County Commissioners Make National Guard Request

The Sussex County Board of County Commissioners discussed the topic during their reorganization meeting on Wednesday night, with the aim to quell the issues before they worsened.

The National Guard had stepped in to assist at Andover Subacute and Rehabilitation II, now called Woodland Behavioral and Nursing Center, with infection control and other duties in May 2020, after 17 bodies of residents who died during the pandemic were found squeezed in a makeshift morgue the month before.

“The staff at these facilities have been particularly hard hit by the latest COVID variant,” Fasano stated in a news release. “We believed it was prudent to get them the help they needed before there was a crisis.”

Fasano said that the nursing home operators agreed to the Guard’s assistance and they were being deployed “after a series of discussions between County Health Department officials, led by the Commissioners, with the State Health Department and with nursing home operators and their staff.”

Though the state ultimately oversees the nursing homes, including inspections, Commissioner Herb Yardley - a former County Health Department administrator - said the county has been watching the new situations unfold at the nursing homes.

However, since May 2020, the county has been waiting on information requests through Open Public Records Act requests that have gone unanswered to determine what happened during the first round.

Yardley said the state’s silence “doesn’t mean we’ve stopped working as closely as possible with State officials to address the ongoing pandemic.”

“The state is responsible to see that what happened in 2020 never happens again,” said Commissioner Chris Carney.

“That’s why we keep a constant eye on those nursing homes within our county and when we see a problem, we push the State to get residents the help they need to stay safe,” he added.

According to New Jersey’s COVID Dashboard, which oversees the licensing of the facilities, Sussex County has the following breakdown for outbreaks as of Jan. 6, 2021:

This compares to neighboring Morris County, which has 35 facility outbreaks listed and 153 cumulative, 299 resident cases and 2,168 cumulative, 469 staff cases and 1,732 cumulative, no resident deaths currently and 531 cumulative and no current staff deaths and 4 cumulative.

Statewide on Jan. 6 per facility self-report surveys, there were 491 facilities with active outbreaks, 4,374 resident cases and 7,315 staff cases.

New Jersey’s Department of Health reports 8,792 lab confirmed, long-term care resident and staff deaths from COVID statewide, with self-report survey figures from the facilities reflecting 8,108 resident and 150 staff deaths.

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