Digis Mak

Before pandemic, 82% of facilities did not meet recommended staffing levelsPay levels are low and competition from hospitals is steepIndustry says inadequate government funding impacts recruitment and retentionNursing home staffs shrunk in the weeks and months after severe COVID-19 outbreaks, according to a new study, and federal data shows most facilities lost more than half their nurses and aides in the past year.The study found facilities have struggled to refill openings, particularly among certified nursing assistants, who provide most bedside care – findings that both complicate and underscore the need for President Joe Biden's push to establish nationwide staffing-level requirements.“Will they come back? Or is this going to be a permanent shock to the caregiving workforce?” ask...

WASHINGTON — Lever Alejos arrived in the nation's capital last week on a bus with dozens of fellow Venezuelans who had traveled more than 1,300 miles from their broken country to the United States. Most had braved poisonous plants and thugs as they trudged through dense jungle on the Colombian border and waded in water up to their chins to cross the Rio Grande into Texas, some clutching babies.After being processed by US border authorities, the undocumented migrants were released into South Texas, free to go where they wanted. Mr. Alejos, 28, said he was offered two options: a $50 bus ride to San Antonio or a free bus ride to Washington, DC, paid for by the State of Texas. “I wanted San Antonio, but I had run out of money,” said Mr. Alejos, who has no family in the United States. “I...

Publisher CBC: Thursday, Aug. 4, 2022; Publisher #8779The following is the opinion of Capitol Broadcasting Company If there is one thing that has become clear in the five weeks since the US Supreme Court overruled the 50-year-old constitutional right to an abortion, it is that personal views on the issue are quite nuanced. It is not as simple as pinning people with “Pro-Life” or “Pro-Choice” labels. There is a spectrum of views within those cliched categories. That is why many among the 57% who disapprove (62% of women; 51% of Catholics) of the high court's decision may still consider themselves “pro-life.” Just this week in conservative Kansas, voters overwhelmingly rejected – 59% no to 41% yes --- an effort to amend the ...

'21st century repression'The effects of Orbán's takeover are in many subtle ways, and Hungary does not outwardly appear to be an authoritarian state.“Budapest is one of the most beautiful cities on Earth. It feels so functional and free — you get there and think 'this can't possibly be a dictatorship,'” says Kim Lane Scheppele, a sociologist at Princeton University and an expert on Hungarian politics.“That's because Orbán's repression is a very 21st-century repression,” she said, adding that the country's democracy had been eroded through changes to the Constitution, rather than through violence.Freedom House, a Washington-based human rights advocacy group, rates Hungary as only a “partly free” country. In its rating for 2022, it said Orbán had used law changes to “consolidate control...