The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced it will distribute approximately $333 million in the first round of quality incentive payments to over 10,000 nursing homes nationwide. 188 Virginia nursing facilities qualified for these incentive payments totaling $5,793,913 for demonstrating significant reductions in COVID-19 related infections and deaths between August and September.

According to the HHS announcement, qualifying nursing homes will receive their incentive payments next week. It is not yet clear how individual facility payments are determined and the list of individual facility payments is not yet available.

Distribution of the incentives is determined by the facility’s performance related to the COVID-19 infection rate relative to the locality and the death rate relative to a national threshold. Nursing homes will have four more opportunities to receive additional incentive payments.

We will provide updates as more details emerge.