26:2H-12.90 Long-Term Care Emergency Operations Center (LTCEOC)
1. a. There is established in the Department of Health the Long-Term Care Emergency Operations Center (LTCEOC), which shall serve as the centralized command and resource center for long-term care facility response efforts and communications during a declared public health emergency affecting or likely to affect one or more long-term care facilities. The LTCEOC shall enhance and integrate with existing State, county, and local emergency response systems.
b. The Department of Health shall have primary responsibility for the operations of the LTCEOC, but the Department of Human Services and other appropriate State agencies shall provide any staff support as shall be requested by the Commissioner of Health. The Commissioner of Health may additionally contract with a third party entity to provide staffing services as needed. At a minimum, the Commissioner of Health shall ensure that the LTCEOC has on call at all times such appropriate staff and consultants as are needed to respond to a declared public health emergency affecting or likely to affect one or more long-term care facilities, including representatives from county and local boards of health, the Office of the New Jersey Long-Term Care Ombudsman, and the Office of Emergency Management in the New Jersey State Police, the acute and post-acute health care industry, as well as experts in public health, infection control, elder affairs, disability services, emergency response, and medical transportation.
c. The primary responsibilities of the LTCEOC shall include, but shall not be limited to:
(1) establishing ongoing, direct communication with the owners and staff of long-term care facilities, unions, advocates representing residents of long-term care facilities and their families, individuals with expertise in the needs of people with specialized health care needs, and such other stakeholders as the Commissioner of Health deems necessary and appropriate during a public health emergency affecting or likely to affect one or more long-term care facilities, which may include the use of existing communication mechanisms and feedback loops in the Department of Health's Office of Disaster Resilience or Health Systems branch, as appropriate;
(2) providing technical assistance to the long-term care industry during the public health emergency, which may be facilitated through local health departments;
(3) ensuring supplies and equipment needed to respond to the public health emergency are acquired and distributed in an effective and efficient manner among long-term care facilities;
(4) utilizing the National Healthcare Safety Network database managed by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to:
(a) identify and respond to critical staffing shortages in long-term care facilities;
(b) if applicable, identify and respond to critical personal protective equipment or ventilator shortages in long-term care facilities;
(c) monitor facility capacity; and
(d) if applicable, monitor infectious disease case counts and deaths by facility; and
(5) ensuring all policies and guidance developed by the Department of Health in response to the public health emergency are effectively communicated to all long-term care industry stakeholders.
d. In the event of a public health emergency declared in response to an infectious disease outbreak, epidemic, or pandemic affecting or likely to affect one or more long-term care facilities, the LTCEOC, in consultation with other offices within the Department of Health and the Office of Emergency Management in the New Jersey Division of State Police, shall determine the need for the establishment of regional hubs capable of accepting patients who have, and are capable of transmitting, the infectious disease and who do not require hospitalization, which hubs shall comply with State and federal guidance regarding infection control practices related to the infectious disease. In the event of a surge in number of identified cases of the infectious disease, the LTCEOC shall actively monitor capacity levels at long-term care facilities and at regional hubs established pursuant to this subsection, if any, using the National Healthcare Safety Network database managed by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and shall take steps to direct patient placements as necessary to manage capacity levels and ensure, to the extent possible, that no regional hub or long-term care facility exceeds safe capacity levels.
e. As used in sections 1 through 5 of P.L.2020, c.87 (C.26:2H-12.90 through C.26:2H-12.94), "infectious disease" means a disease caused by a living organism or other pathogen, including a fungus, bacteria, parasite, protozoan, virus, or prion. An infectious disease may, or may not, be transmissible from person to person, animal to person, or insect to person.
L.2020, c.87, s.1.