Jason Delgado
Gov. Ron DeSantis on Friday highlighted a large shipment of personal protective equipment delivered this week to help reopen long-term care facilities.
The PPE includes five million masks, four million gloves, and two million gowns. The shipment will help long-term-care residents reunite with loved ones for the first time since the COVID-19 outbreak in Florida.
“Since the beginning of the pandemic, my administration’s top priority has been to protect individuals most vulnerable to COVID-19,” DeSantis said. “We hope this direct shipment of PPE to long-term care facilities throughout the state helps them safely transition to allowing limited visitation.”
Limited visitations are a product of Emergency Order 20-009. The order allows for limited visitations under strict cleaning, staffing, and capacity requirements.
In a news conference on Tuesday, the Governor said visitors must wear personal protective equipment and pass a virus screening. He also said appointments will be required.
According to the order, facilities would need to go 14 days without any new cases of COVID-19 among staff or residents to allow the visits. The order mandates a facility to stop all indoor and outdoor visitation in the event a staff member tests positive for COVID-19,
“From the beginning, Florida has led on long term care facility PPE and testing, and we are continuing to lead the way today,” said Florida Emergency Management Director Jared Moskowitz. “For the last 90 days, we have been running the largest long-term care testing mission in the nation. I have no doubt that the actions we have taken to protect nursing home residents have saved lives, and we will continue to do everything we can to keep our most vulnerable populations safe.”
In all, long-term care facilities have now received more than 15 million masks, five million gloves, roughly three million gowns, and over 50,000 face shields.
