#Yukio Okutsu

Funds Will Support Improved Facilities, Continued Operations For Home That Suffered Major COVID Outbreak Last Fall

The COVID-19 cluster included 71 infections of patients and 35 staff, and resulted in 27 deaths.

“What happens next will be critical. The transition plan to a new management team must put the health and safety of patients and staff first. HHSC must also ensure that a change in management does not adversely impact staffing and census in other facilities and that all residents of nursing facilities on Hawai‘i Island receive care in the most appropriate setting,” said Sen. Schatz.

The VA report noted: “There was very little proactive preparation/planning for COVID. Many practices observed seemed as if they were a result of recent changes. Even though these are improvements, these are things that should have been in place from the pandemic onset and a major contributing factor towards the rapid spread. A basic understanding of segregation and workflow seemed to be lacking even approximately three weeks after [the] first positive.”

A new report from the US Department of Veterans Affairs was released detailing serious infection control issues that contributed to the deadly COVID-19 outbreak at the Yukio Okutsu State Veterans Home in Hilo.

State officials have confirmed 15 of the 18 deaths reported at the Yukio Okutsu State Veterans Home in Hilo on Hawaiʻi Island.  The state Department of health had previously confirmed three deaths, and today, confirmed 12 more deaths among residents of the facility.

The US Department of Veterans Affairs has mobilized a team of infection control experts, nurses and other health care professionals to provide immediate support and help contain a COVID-19 outbreak at the Yukio Okutsu State Veterans Home in Hilo.