The following is the latest COVID-19 information from the federal government as of 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday, November 24.

Provider Relief Fund

The Provider Relief Fund web page has been updated with the following notice:

The application deadline for the Provider Relief Fund Phase 3 General Distribution was Nov. 6, 2020. You must have submitted your Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN) for validation by 11:59 p.m. ET on Nov. 6, 2020 for Phase 3 relief funds. If you submitted your TIN for validation by the deadline and your TIN is validated by Nov. 13, you will be able to proceed with submitting your revenue documentation to complete your application by 11:59 p.m. ET on Nov. 27, 2020.

Department of Health and Human Services

  • HHS has announced plans to allocate doses of the investigational monoclonal antibody therapeutics casirivimab and imdevimab for treatment of non-hospitalized patients with mild or moderate confirmed cases of COVID-19 at high risk of hospitalization; this is often referred to publicly as the Regeneron antibody cocktail. HHS will allocate 300,000 federally-purchased doses to state and territorial health departments that will determine which health care facilities receive the infusion drug.  Weekly allocations of the drug will be proportionally based on confirmed COVID-19 cases in each state and territory over the previous seven days based on data that hospitals and state health departments enter into the HHS Protect data collection platform.  Learn more from HHS’s announcement about the allocation plan.  Find additional information about allocation here.
  • HHS has published a Request for Information notice in which it seeks to “…gather information on effective innovative approaches and best practices in health care in response to the COVID-19 pandemic by non-HHS health care systems and providers.” Comments are due by December 24.  Go here to see the brief notice.
  • HHS’s Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response has posted a paper on the designation of individual hospitals as COVID-19 hospitals within health systems or geographic areas.
  • HHS’s Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response has posted a report on crisis standards of care and patient surge management for COVID-19.
  • HHS’s Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response has posted a presentation with information on the use of point-of-care tests for the diagnosis of COVID-19.

 

Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services

  • CMS has posted the first episode in a series of short podcasts for frontline nursing home staff. The series, “CMS Beyond the Policy:  Nursing Home Series for Frontline Clinicians and Staff,” is designed to reinforce training and infection control practices in nursing homes to help combat the spread of COVID-19.  To listen to the podcast, go here.

 

Food and Drug Administration

 

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

 

Department of Labor