By BRENT MARTIN
St. Joseph Post
President Joe Biden has informed Congress his administration plans to end COVID-19 emergency measures as of May 11th, nearly three years after the coronavirus pandemic began.
Mosaic Life Care CEO Mike Poore says Mosaic supports the move.
“From 0ur perspective, I think that is appropriate,” Moore tells reporters when asked about the move. “We still have coronavirus throughout the United States and in our service area, but it’s really normalizing in the fact that it’s just like many of the other diseases that we take care of on a daily basis.”
Poore says the numbers have dropped dramatically.
Mosaic has been seeing as many as 20 COVID-19 patients in a given week, but rarely does the St. Joseph hospital have to treat more than a single patient in its ICU.
Mosaic was treating nearly 100 coronavirus patients on any given day at the end of 2020.
“I mean, it’s sort of like the flu now. We don’t tell a lot of difference. There’s not much of a trend that we’ve seen,” Poore says. “It’s a lot less severe when we see those patients.”
The Biden administration move to end the national emergency and public health emergency declarations would formally restructure the federal coronavirus response to treat the virus as an endemic threat to public health that can be managed through agencies' normal authorities.
Legislators did extend for another two years telehealth flexibilities that were introduced as COVID-19 hit, leading health care systems around the country to regularly deliver care by smartphone or computer.
The Biden administration had previously considered ending the emergency last year, but held off amid concerns about a potential “winter surge” in cases and to provide adequate time for providers, insurers, and patients to prepare for its end.
Poore says Mosaic has shifted how it manages COVID patients.
“It is something that we’re going to have to live with as a society, just like flu and other ailments that we get that come through the community,” Moore says. “Get your vaccine, just like your flu vaccine can help and especially for those populations that are more at risk.”
The administration of President Donald Trump first declared a public health emergency at the end of January 2020. Trump declared the COVID-19 pandemic a national emergency that March. President Biden has extended the emergencies ever since.
More than 1.1 million people in the U.S. have died from COVID-19 since 2020, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including about 3,700 last week.