Cap temporarily lifted on beds at Louisiana nursing homes for Francine evacuations

An executive order from Gov. Jeff Landry allows nursing homes in Louisiana to exceed their allowed capacities to accommodate any evacuations from comparable facilities in the path of Tropical Storm Francine. (Getty Images)

Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry has temporarily lifted the caps on the number of residents each nursing home in Louisiana can hold in order to ease evacuations ahead of Tropical Storm Francine, which is expected to become a hurricane before it makes landfall Wednesday.

Landry’s change, issued through an executive order Tuesday, is expected to allow more nursing home residents who are evacuated to go to similar facilities elsewhere in the state instead of shelters that might not be equipped with the supplies and equipment typically found at a nursing facility.

“We don’t want them scattered where we’re not sure of the health care,” Louisiana Surgeon General Ralph Abraham said at a press conference Tuesday morning.

Most nursing homes in the path of Tropical Storm Francine plan to have their residents shelter in place. Only one nursing home in Vermilion Parish has relocated anyone. It transferred eight patients to a nursing home in DeSoto Parish, Abraham said.

In an interview, Abraham said there would be no upper limit to the number of evacuated residents a nursing home can temporarily receive.

“I think that’s sort of a play-it-by-ear situation,” he said.

Even without an executive order, nursing homes have typically accepted evacuated residents from comparable facilities, though sometimes spaces such as churches are used. Nursing home owners are paid extra for each evacuated resident they temporarily house during natural disasters.

All homes are required to submit emergency plans to the Louisiana Department of Health outlining what they plan to do with residents in the event of a natural disaster. But nursing home owners who want to take residents to a safer nursing home instead of another type of shelter, such as a church, for Tropical Storm Francine will be allowed to do so, Abraham said.

Several nursing home facilities in Louisiana already have extra beds available, and some in central and north Louisiana have built special shelters on their properties so they can house more evacuees for storms.

Landry’s focus on nursing home safety is likely a response to the disastrous evacuation of 800 nursing home residents to a former pesticide warehouse in Tangipahoa Parish during Hurricane Ida in 2021.

State health officials attributed the deaths of at least five people to the poor conditions there and took away owner Bob Dean’s nursing home licenses. Victims of the botched move and their families have sued Dean, seeking financial damages.

Abraham said the health department has been in constant communication with the Louisiana Nursing Home Association, in which most nursing home owners are members.

The governor’s executive order lifts the cap on nursing home bed restrictions until Oct. 10, when the normal limits would be expected to go back into place.