Other federal health agencies

Summary

This cluster collects the federal health and human-services instruments that changed how health-care, child-care, education, food-service, correctional-contractor and benefits-dependent employers operated, quarter by quarter, in every State. They are of four kinds. First, the compelled-substitute predicates: the HHS Office for Civil Rights notifications of March 17, April 2 and April 9, 2020 (published at 85 Fed. Reg. 22024, 19392 and 29637) under which OCR 'will not impose penalties' for the good-faith provision of telehealth through non-public-facing applications, for business-associate public-health disclosures and for the operation of community-based testing sites; the DEA letters of March 16, 20, 25, 27 and 31 and April 7, 10, 13 and 21, 2020 that designated the section 802(54)(D) public-health-emergency telemedicine allowance for all schedule II-V substances, excepted practitioners from separate State registrations, permitted oral and faxed schedule II orders, permitted telephone induction of buprenorphine, permitted off-site and doorstep delivery of methadone and buprenorphine take-home doses, permitted satellite hospital locations under an existing registration and suspended the five-percent distribution rule; and the SAMHSA exemption of March 16, 2020 permitting States to obtain blanket 28-day and 14-day take-home exceptions for opioid treatment programs (renewed November 18, 2021 for one year past the end of the emergency and made permanent by the rule of February 2, 2024). Every one of these instruments was in force on July 1 and September 30, 2021; the DEA telemedicine flexibilities were extended by rule through November 11, 2024. Second, the supply-chain and product layer: the HHS Secretary's section 564 declarations of February 4, March 2, March 24 and March 27, 2020 and the PREP Act declaration effective February 4, 2020; the FDA emergency use authorizations for ventilators (March 24, 2020), NIOSH-approved respirators (March 2, 2020, reissued July 12, 2021 to withdraw decontaminated and expired respirators), imported non-NIOSH respirators (March 24, 2020, revoked July 6, 2021), the Battelle decontamination system (March 28, 2020, revoked June 30, 2021), face shields (April 9, 2020), gowns (May 22, 2020) and surgical masks (August 5, 2020); the FDA enforcement policies for face masks and respirators (March 25, 2020) and ventilators (March 22, 2020); the temporary policies permitting hand-sanitizer manufacture by distillers and other firms (March 19 and 24, 2020), the sale of restaurant-labeled packaged food without Nutrition Facts labels (March 26, 2020) and relief from chain-restaurant menu labeling (April 1, 2020); and the CLIA-laboratory testing policy of February 29, 2020. Third, the facility-access and benefits-office layer: the VA 'No Visitor' stance and suspension of nursing-home admissions of March 10, 2020, the discontinuance of committal services at national cemeteries from March 23, 2020, the closure of the 56 VBA regional offices to the public from March 19, 2020, the VA interim final rules of May 27, June 5 and November 12, 2020 (electronic consent; remote caregiver home visits; preemption of State licensure for VA professionals), and the VA vaccination mandates of July 26 and August 13, 2021 reaching volunteers and contractors; the Bureau of Prisons COVID-19 Action Plan of March 13, 2020 suspending social and legal visits, volunteer visits, inmate movement and contractor access for 30 days, extended by Phases Three through Nine through the summer of 2020 (social visiting resumed only October 3, 2020 under non-contact protocols), the nationwide securing of institutions on January 16, 2021, the Attorney General's memoranda of March 26 and April 3, 2020 directing home confinement under CARES Act section 12003(b)(2), and the BOP rule of June 22, 2020 on free video visitation; the Social Security Administration's closure of every local office to the public for in-person service from March 17, 2020 until April 7, 2022, and its pandemic-period rules of August 27, 2020 and July 23, 2021; Fourth, the child-care, education and food layer: the ACF interim final rules of December 7, 2020 (Head Start designation renewals during the emergency, reciting the suspension of CLASS reviews and classroom closures) and November 30, 2021 (Head Start universal masking effective immediately and staff, contractor and volunteer vaccination by January 31, 2022, post-period); the Office of Child Care memoranda CCDF-ACF-IM-2020-01 (March 2020) and CCDF-ACF-IM-2021-02 (May 10, 2021; ARP stabilization grants conditioned on following CDC and State health guidance); and the USDA Food and Nutrition Service regime under FFCRA sections 2202 and 2302: the nationwide child-nutrition waivers (non-congregate meals, meal-time and parent pick-up waivers, extended through school year 2021-22), the SNAP emergency allotments issued monthly to every State with a State emergency declaration, and the Pandemic EBT rule of November 4, 2020 keyed to school and child-care closures and reduced attendance. By quarter: 2020 Q2 saw every instrument issued and in force; 2020 Q3 and Q4 saw the BOP phases run through October 3, 2020, the FNS waivers extended for the 2020-21 school year, the VA practice-authority rule and the P-EBT rule; 2021 Q1 and Q2 saw the OCR scheduling-application notification, the BOP lockdown of January 16, 2021, the reissued Battelle and imported-respirator EUAs, the ACF stabilization memorandum and the SNAP information-collection renewals; 2021 Q3 saw the imported-respirator EUAs revoked (July 6, 2021), the NIOSH respirator EUA narrowed (July 12, 2021), the DEA home-as-registered-location guidance (July 8, 2021), the DEA mobile-NTP rule take effect (July 28, 2021), the CDC dog-importation suspension take effect (July 14, 2021), the SSA close-proximity rule (July 23, 2021), the VA vaccination mandates (July 26 and August 13, 2021) and the FDA revocation notice (August 31, 2021), while the OCR notifications, the DEA and SAMHSA exceptions, the Provider Relief Fund terms, the SSA office closure, the BOP modified operations, the FNS waivers and the SNAP emergency allotments all remained in force on September 30, 2021.