OSHA Releases Covid-19 Workplace Safety Rule for Healthcare Workers
The U.S. Labor Department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) on Thursday released a workplace safety rule intended to protect workers from exposure to SARS-Cov-2, the virus that causes Covid-19.
Called an Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS), the rule applies only to workers in healthcare settings, a disappointment for unions and other workplace safety advocates.
Essential requirements of the ETS include, but are not limited to: developing and implementing a plan for each workplace; designating workplace safety coordinator(s), knowledgeable in infection control principles and practices, with the authority to implement, monitor, and ensure compliance with the plan; conducting a workplace-specific hazard assessment; and seeking the involvement of nonmanagerial employees and their representatives in the hazard assessment and plan’s development and implementation.
The ETS also includes requirements about personal protective equipment, physical distancing, cleaning and disinfection, training, vaccination, ventilation, and more.
Click
here for more information in OSHA’s summary of the rule.
Senators Murphy and Cassidy Introduce The Parity Implementation Assistance Act
Senators Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) and Bill Cassidy, M.D. (R-La.) this week introduced
The Parity Implementation Assistance Act to offer incentives to states to comply with mental health parity requirements.
The bill would authorize $25 million in grants for states to support their oversight efforts of health insurance plans’ compliance with parity. The new legislation builds on the
Murphy-Cassidy Mental Health Parity Compliance Act of 2019, which became law last year and provided federal and state health insurance regulators with additional resources to monitor and assure compliance with mental health parity laws.
U.S. Reps. Tony Cárdenas (D-Calif.) and Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) are introducing a companion bill in the House.
“We applaud Senators Murphy and Cassidy and Representatives Cárdenas and Fitzpatrick for their continued leadership and steadfast commitment to improving compliance with MHPAEA,” NABH President and CEO Shawn Coughlin said in the senators’ joint news release about the bill this week. “
The Parity Implementation Assistance Act would provide critically needed resources to state regulators so they can improve parity enforcement using the new documentation requirements,” he added.
Americans Identify Affordability and Provider Availability as Biggest Barriers to Accessing Care
A new Bipartisan Policy Center-Morning Consult national
poll found that 51% of Americans surveyed cited affordability and 41% cited availability of providers taking new patients as the two biggest barriers to accessing the care they need.
Meanwhile, a majority of Americans (58%) said the cost of a provider and whether the provider is in their insurance network (58%) are their top priorities when seeking treatment.
“This survey shows that we must tackle the high cost and the enormous shortage of mental health professionals in our country by advancing the integration of primary care and mental health and substance use services,” Marilyn Serafini, the Bipartisan Policy Center’s health project director, said in an announcement about the poll. “We know integrated care works. It enhances treatment, improves outcomes, and is cost effective.”
MHA Names Schroeder Stribling as New President and CEO
Mental Health America this week named Schroeder Stribling as the community-based, not-for-profit’s new president and CEO, effective June 28.
Stribling will start her new role after 18 years at N Street Village, a not-for-profit that provides housing support services for women and families in Washington, D.C. Most recently Stribling served as N Street Village’s CEO and helped the organization expand to eight locations from one. She also helped diversify revenue streams, create partnerships with government entities, and lead city-wide initiatives on homelessness.
Before her time at N Street Village, Stribling was a senior social worker at Johns Hopkins Bayview Hospital, where she was responsible for implementing new mental health programs in the inner-city Head Start school system. Stribling earned a bachelor’s degree in political science from Wellesley College, a master’s degree in social work from Smith College, and a certificate in nonprofit management from Georgetown University.
Forbes Reports Venture Funding for Mental Health Hits Record High
Venture investors poured a record $1.5 billion into mental health startups in 2020, as 42% of U.S. adults reported symptoms of anxiety or depression, compared with about 11% who reported those symptoms in 2019, according to a recent article in
Forbes.
The article notes there are now seven mental health unicorns in the United States, up from only two a year ago. In venture capital, a unicorn is a privately held company valued at more than $1 billion.
Forbes identifies the U.S.-based mental health unicorns as Genoa ($2.5 billion), Lyra Health ($2.3 billion), Calm ($2 billion), BetterUp ($1.7 billion), Talkspace ($1.4 billion), Modern Health ($1.4 billion), and Ginger ($1.1 billion).
“I hope that the interest in mental health is now persistent,” Lisa Suennen, a healthcare investor who leads the venture fund at law firm and consultancy Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, said in the article. Suennen added that both the funding surge and ballooning valuations concern her. “Some of these valuations are beyond appropriate given the underlying fundamentals,” Suennen said. “And that’s not unique to mental health, that’s digital health across the board right now.”
AMA and Advocacy Resource Center Highlight National and State Research on America’s Overdose Crisis
The American Medical Association and Advocacy Resource Center have released a nearly 30-page issue brief that aggregates data on the nation’s drug overdose crisis from national, state, and local public health agencies, law enforcement, emergency medical services, hospitals, treatment centers, journals, and the media.
Every state has reported an increase in overdose deaths during the Covid-19 pandemic, according to the
issue brief.
HRSA Announces New Education Loan Repayment Program
The U.S. Health Department’s Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) announced a new loan repayment program that broadens the types of providers and facilities that are eligible to participate and provides a higher rate of repayment.
The
STAR-LRP will provide repayment of education loans for individuals working in a full-time substance-use disorder (SUD) treatment job that involves direct patient care at a STAR LRP-approved facility located in either a Health Professional Shortage Area (HPSA) designated for Mental Health, or a county/municipality where the average drug overdose death rate exceeds the national average.
Participants will receive up to $250,000 in exchange for six years of full-time SUD employment (including fellowship) that involves direct treatment or recovery support of patients with or in recovery from a substance use disorder.
The program expands access to SUD treatment through the inclusion of disciplines and treatment facilities that are not eligible for existing loan repayment programs. The STAR-LRP is open to master’s level social workers, psychologists, counselors, marriage and family therapists, psychiatric mental health practitioners, occupational therapists, psychology doctoral interns, and behavioral health paraprofessionals and physicians, physician assistants, and nurses, who are involved full-time in SUD treatment employment (including fellowships).
Among the
eligible facilities are
for-profit programs, including but not limited to inpatient psychiatric facilities, inpatient rehabilitation, non-opioid SUD Treatment facilities, opioid treatment programs, office-based opioid treatment, outpatient rehabilitation.
HRSA anticipates making
$28 million available to fund approximately 112 loan repayment awards in FY 2021. Applications are
due by July 22, 2021, 7:30 p.m. ET.
DOJ Accepting Applications for Opioid, Stimulant, and Substance Abuse Program Training and Technical Assistance Program
The U.S. Justice Department’s Office of Justice Programs and Bureau of Justice Assistance will accept grant applications for its Comprehensive Opioid, Stimulant, and Substance Abuse Program (COSSAP) Training and Technical Assistance Program through Monday, June 21.
The program’s purpose is to identify one provider to support a collaborative team and coordinate training and technical assistance for state, tribal, and local criminal justice and substance abuse treatment agencies and their partner agencies for more than 400 COSSAP site-based programs.
Click
here to learn more and to apply.
Registration Now Open for the NABH 2021 Annual Meeting
Registration is open for the NABH 2021 Annual Meeting from Wednesday, Oct. 6 – Friday, Oct. 8, 2021 at the Mandarin Oriental Washington, DC.
We hope you join us as we recognize our meeting theme,
Expanding Access: Right Care. Right Setting. Right Time.
Please visit our Annual Meeting
webpage to register for the meeting and to reserve your hotel room. We look forward to seeing you in Washington!
Fact of the Week
Nearly one in four older U.S. adults between the ages of 50 and 80 reported they had three or more alcoholic drinks in one sitting, according to a new
poll from the University of Michigan’s National Poll on Healthy Aging.
