The National Governors Association (NGA) on Thursday asked the Trump administration to postpone planned modifications to hospital reporting requirements for 30 days.
“The administration has stated that they plan to use this data to better allocate supplies and medications to states,” the NGA said in a statement.
“To ensure accurate reporting of these data, governors request a 30-day delay of these new requirements, so that hospitals learn a new system, while continuing to deal with this pandemic. In addition, the governors urge the administration to make this information public, “added the NGA.
Earlier this week, the Trump administration changed its reporting rules for hospitals, directing them to submit data on the availability of hospital beds and intensive care units directly to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), instead from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as before.
Public health experts expressed concern about the change, although the administration argued that while the HHS database is not public, it will make compiling patient data more efficient.
HHS Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Michael Caputo said CDC was ordered to make the data available again after it disappeared from the CDC website.
“HHS is committed to being transparent to the American public about the information it is collecting about the coronavirus,” he told The Hill in a statement Thursday. “Therefore, HHS ordered CDC to reinstate the coronavirus boards it removed from the public on Wednesday.”
However, the website dashboard only includes data as of July 14, and a notice on the website indicates that it will not be updated.
CDC Director Robert Redfield also played down the change, saying the agency will have the same amount of access to hospital data and that “no one is taking away access or data to CDC.”
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