MEMORANDUM – COVID-19 Update

March 9, 2021

Dear Residents, Family Members, Trustees, Community Partners, and Staff,

Yesterday the CDC published guidance for how to protect yourself and others when you’ve been fully vaccinated. A copy of the high-level guidance is attached to this memo for your reference. Additional information can be found from the CDC.

The guidance provides guidelines for situations where fully vaccinated individuals may gather indoors together without masks or with unvaccinated people from another household provided none of these individuals or anyone they live with has an increased risk of severe illness from Covid-19. The guidance still recommends avoiding medium and large sized gatherings and delaying domestic and international travel. The guidance also indicates it is not intended for individuals living in in group settings and that fully vaccinated individuals should continue to follow guidance to protect themselves and others in public settings. 

Our Covid Taskforce met yesterday to discuss the new guidance and any changes we felt were appropriate to our Covid Protocols at this time. Effective March 15th, we will no longer require daily temperature checks and health screening for staff and residents, however, we will continue temperature checks and health screening for all visitors and outside caregivers. Over the last year, this process has not identified a single case of Covid in our community. With the high level of vaccination in our community, 98% of residents and 87% of staff, we feel that this is no longer necessary for those two groups.

Our Dining Services team is making plans to begin reopening communal dining for Independent Living Residents on March 17th. This will be a symbolic event as it marks the one-year anniversary of when our last meal was served in our dining rooms. We are looking to reopen our guest rooms with some limitations in April or May.

All other Covid protocols for our community including the use of masks, visitor limitations, and capacity limits for events, will remain in place at this time until we have more information regarding the effectiveness of the vaccines against variants of the virus and how the vaccines keep people from spreading the disease. Individuals are encouraged, however, to follow the newly released guidelines when in their own homes or the homes of others as applicable.

If you have any questions regarding these new changes, please contact Julie Parker, Chief Operating Officer, at julieparker@nullcanterburyccrc.org or 404.201.7067 or me at debimcneil@nullcanterburyccrc.org or 470.381.36790.

Warmly,

Debi McNeil

President & CEO