(The Center Square) – The Illinois House Veterans’ Affairs Committee will meet Tuesday to provide more oversight into the COVID-19 outbreak at the LaSalle Veterans’ Home last month that killed at least 33 residents.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker said Friday that lessons have been learned and that he “bears responsibility.”
The outbreak started in early November and spread in the following days, infecting scores of residents and staff. It took at least 10 days for the state’s inspectors to visit the site.
The last public hearing on the issue was held virtually by the Illinois Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee before Thanksgiving. A report released before the hearing highlighted poor ventilation and ineffective hand sanitizer, among other issues.
State Sen. Craig Wilcox, R-McHenry, asked public health consultant Dr. Avery Hart about employees of the home who tested positive or had been exposed, but continued to work.
“You’re saying they were in the COVID unit already so they were not potentially exposing non-COVID patients?” Wilcox asked. “They were just at increased risk because they were only in the COVID-unit, is that an oversimplification of what I had heard?”
“No, that’s the important point, yes sir,” Hart said.
State Sen. Laura Ellman, D-Naperville, read part of a report about staff conduct at that hearing.
“Three staff members in the kitchen with masks around their chins, eating and all less than six feet from each other,” she said. “Wearing gloves, touching patients and multiple surfaces without changing and performing hand hygiene.”
Pritzker on Friday said he “bears responsibility of leadership” for the state.
“We’re doing everything we can to make it transparent, we’ve done inspections, we’ve uncovered things that need to be changed and we’ve made those changes,” Pritzker said.
The administrator of the home was fired. Pritzker said he couldn’t discuss some aspects of what is a personnel matter. The nursing director is on paid leave pending an investigation by an inspector general.
A House committee will hear more testimony from the involved state agencies.