Our speaker on 19 August was George Linial, who is a member of our club and has been a Rotarian for 19 years. His organization, LeadingAge Texas, is a trade association that represents not--for-profits in the aging services field , and has 200 members around the state. George spoke to us about COVID’s effect on long-term care using a slides to show us aging statistics and COVID. The US and Texas have an aging population. Those 85 and older are fastest growing part of population. George described what long-term care is - help with daily living activities. He pointed out that we need more resources to help with the aging population and need to have realistic view of costs. Affordability will be a driving force. With regards to COVID-19, it spreads like the flu, but is more contagious. Because it is spread through close contact, it is easily spread in long-term care facilities because there is a lot of close contact. George described its symptoms and the fact that infected people can be asymptomatic and spread the virus without realizing it and also described prevention techniques. Get your flu shot! It will ease the burden on health care during the upcoming flu season and may protect from some of the symptoms of COVID. Community spread is leading to cases in nursing homes. Masks are important to protect others! George showed as some statistics on cases, including those in nursing facilities. About 1/2 of facilities in Texas have active cases. 80% of nursing homes have had cases at one point; 3000 deaths occurred among nursing home patients. Assisted living facilities are doing a bit better, but still have had close to 400 deaths. George suggested some short-term solutions for long-term care facilities without vaccine: need access to plenty of PPE, rapid testing capability, reduce community spread, and provide an adequate workforce. The hot issues in long term facilities are visitation, testing, PPE, and staffing. Texas has announced limited visitations under certain conditions including being COVID free for 14 days and testing all staff every week- nursing homes visits outside - visits are supervised to make sure there is compliance. Thank you George for letting us know how long-term care facilities are dealing with COVID and what we can do to help mitigate the spread of the virus.