Some long-term facilities making their own rules ahead of the holidays

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Despite an emergency order passed in October allowing residents of long-term and senior living facilities to go home, some facilities are allegedly making their own rules.

Mary Daniel tells Action News Jax, “I really wanted him to come home for Christmas just really one night maybe just to be home.”

Daniel says that’s no longer happening because her husband’s facility would require him to quarantine for two weeks after he returned.

“That’s incredibly hard especially for somebody like my husband who has Alzheimer’s, he doesn’t know why he’s locked in his room.”

So instead her family will come to spend some time with him at the facility and make the most of it.

Daniel says many families planned to bring their loved ones home for the holidays, but now they can’t because individual facilities are making their own rules.

“You’ve got people who promised their loved ones that they would bring them home and they’re not going to be able to do that and that’s not fair. We don’t deserve that, we deserve better than that.”

When we took a look at the order, we found there was a lot of room for interpretation.

Daniel herself says the language is vague.

We found that the Agency for Health Care Administration addressed this emergency order. (SEE BELOW)

It reads in part quote “Residents must be permitted to leave the facility if they wish, including holiday visits.”

Daniels explains, “But they have chosen not to enforce that and that’s very confusing for us who use that order as our foundation.”

When Daniel asked why the order wasn’t being enforced she received this email back from AHCA which reads in part, “The procedures outlined in the AHCA FAQ were minimum requirements facilities must meet… Facilities may implement additional measures to protect their residents while still allowing holiday leave.”

It’s the same response other members of the media received regarding the same issue.

“It was never discussed that this was a minimum requirement.”

And while she understands the risk involved with bringing their loved ones home, she believes families deserve better.

“Look us in the eye. Tell us it’s not safe. Let us understand that and then let’s move forward, but that’s not what’s happened here and that’s disappointing to me.”

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Cox Media Group