CHENANGO COUNTY – On Friday, the New York State Department of Health announced the resumption of limited visitation for residents of nursing homes and adult care facilities.

Residents may have up to two people visit at a time. However for each facility, only ten percent of the residents can be allowed visitors at any time. For example, if a facility has 100 beds, only 10 residents can have visitors per day.

State Department of Health Commissioner Dr. Howard Zucker stated in his announcement that nursing homes and long term care facilities in New York will be allowed to resume limited visitations for facilities that have been without COVID-19 for at least 28 days, this was a threshold set by the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services in order to maintain proper social distancing.

At least one of the visitors must be 18 years of age and both visitors must undergo temperature checks, wear face coverings and socially distance during the visit.

Before facilities can allow visitors, they will be required to send their visitation plan to NYSDOH with an attestation that they are following the guidelines.