Faced with uncertainty due to the COVID-19 vaccine mandate and an overwhelming delta variant, top leaders at Providence Medical Group Southwest Washington were unable to find a unified voice as they unsuccessfully asked Lewis County leaders last month to proclaim a state of emergency.
Chief Executive Darin Goss sent out a letter Friday to county leadership apologizing for the medical group’s mixed messaging while spelling out what went wrong through their “many channels of communication” with the county.
“Recently, Providence felt the urgency through the (county’s) Emergency Management Department to request an emergency proclamation, as the delta variant dramatically increased our inpatient volumes and Providence did not have clear line of sight regarding the impending vaccination mandate and its impact to our operators,” Goss wrote.
“We now recognize there was not alignment across Providence leadership in our ask of Lewis County Department of Emergency Management to declare the emergency proclamation. I regret that this took place and recognize this placed the county in a precarious political position,” he continued.
A couple weeks ago, Lewis County Emergency Management asked the Board of Lewis County Commissioners to pass a state of emergency in order to secure resources to address a forecasted shortage of medical workers at the facility, among other needs.
Staff told commissioners that emergency responders and medical providers had voiced concern about resources and staffing shortages in the leadup to the vaccine mandate. But Commissioner Sean Swope objected to bringing in federal workers to help when they were laying off unvaccinated workers, calling their request “terrible.”
The county hasn’t been in a formal state of emergency since the COVID-19 pandemic declaration expired in August.
But Goss in his letter also confirmed that Providence Centralia has had trouble staffing overwhelmed intensive care units and respiratory therapy resources, though it’s not clear to what extent, if any, the vaccine mandate has with that. Providence Southwest has previously touted a compliance rate of over 98% with Gov. Jay Inslee’s vaccination mandate but has declined to give information on how many of those are vaccinations or exemptions.
“Although over the past several weeks our COVID census has improved, we cannot predict the future and to this day staffing remains challenged at Providence Centralia Hospital, especially with intensive care nursing and respiratory therapy resources,” Goss said.
A county state of emergency would have allowed the hospital to call in federal workers, staff say.
“As the pandemic evolves, Providence will collaborate with county leaders if additional county decisions help us care for our community,” Goss’ letter concludes.
In an interview last week, Lewis County Manager Erik Martin confirmed that Providence’s mixed messaging caused confusion for county staff on what needed to be done. The discussion was really around “resources,” Martin said, as they considered a state of emergency declaration.
Martin said the county wants to be responsive when the need is there, but it also wants to be responsible about how it goes about addressing problems caused by COVID-19.
“I think we were unclear of the benefit, which is why we hit pause on it and are still gathering information,” he said.
Swope said his reasoning behind opposing a county state of emergency lies solely with the debate around bringing in federal workers to do a job he’d rather see be done by an unvaccinated worker.
There was also a lot of discussion about “what if” scenarios that he said didn’t merit a declaration unless they came to light. If the need is timely and concerning enough, commissioners can call a meeting “in minutes,” Swope said.
“That’s like us declaring a state of emergency for the flood that could happen next week,” Swope said.
He also said Providence Southwest staff told him only two to three people at the regional hospital system had been let go due to the vaccine mandate, and that staff gave conflicting information on the overall severity of the situation.
