ATLANTA – COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths in Georgia are rising but remain well below levels seen during the coronavirus pandemic, State Epidemiologist Dr. Cherie Drenzek said Tuesday.
About 17.000 Georgians were hospitalized with the virus during the past week, an increase of 16% over the previous week, Drenzek told members of the Georgia Board of Public Health at their monthly meeting.
COVID-19 deaths in Georgia also rose by 11% to about 700, Drenzek said. But in both cases, the numbers are significantly lower than during the peak of the pandemic, she said.
In fact, there were twice as many deaths from COVID-19 last January and 10 times more deaths in January 2022, when the omicron variant was at its peak, Drenzek said.
Drenzek said the EG.5 variant of the virus is the dominant strain now circulating in Georgia, followed closely by several other strains that derive from the omicron variant. However, the BA.2.86 variant – which has been the subjects of a lot of news coverage – has yet to appear in Georgia, she said.
Help is on the way in the form of a new COVID vaccine the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved on Monday. The new booster, which should be available by next week, is expected to protect against the strains of the virus now in circulation.
“We cannot be complacent,” Drenzek said. “COVID is still with us and will remain with us for years, particularly among immunocompromised people.”
Drenzek said she expects a more typical RSV season this fall and winter than last year, when cases rose due to a widespread lack of immunity. She said the circulation of RSV fell during the pandemic because of social distancing, only to rebound last year when infants born during the pandemic got exposed to the virus for the first time.
New tools to combat RSV will be on the market this fall, including a new monoclonal antibody product for children up to 19 months of age and two new vaccines for adults 60 and older.
Drenzek said flu season seems to have started early this year, similar to the experience in Georgia last year. She said a new flu vaccine is recommended for everyone more than 6 months old.
“These three respiratory viruses will circulate and can have tremendous impact,” she said. “The good news is they are preventable. … It’s absolutely critical to utilize the tools we have available to us.”
ATLANTA – Representatives of Georgia hospitals expressed support Tuesday for streamlining the state’s certificate of need (CON) process for licensing new health-care facilities and medical services without scrapping the law entirely.
The Georgia Hospital Association has adopted a set of recommendations aimed at limiting the number of parties that can attempt to block approval of CON applications and reducing the time it takes to appeal adverse CON rulings, Anna Adams, the GHA’s executive vice president of external affairs, told members of a state House subcommittee at a hearing in Albany.
The committee was formed to look for ways to modernize a CON law that dates back to 1979.
The GHA’s board adopted 14 recommendations last week for changes to CON, including allowing only in-state entities with a service area “substantially” overlapping that of a proposed hospital to challenge its CON application.
The association also suggested moving the consideration of appeals to adverse CON decisions from a panel overseen by the state Department of Community Health to the Georgia Office of State Administrative Hearings. Adams said the OSAH is a “well-oiled machine” that would be able to speed up the handling of appeals.
Aside from changes to CON, Adams said the GHA also would support legislative efforts at tort reform, an issue Gov. Brian Kemp has vowed to push during the upcoming legislative session to rein in the soaring costs of medical malpractice insurance.
“We want to make sure [health-care] providers feel safe to practice in Georgia,” she said. “In some cases, they’re practicing defensive medicine because they’re afraid of these runaway [jury] verdicts.”
While the General Assembly has considered bills to repeal CON in Georgia entirely, those who testified on Tuesday said the CON law helps hold down the costs of health care.
Monty Veazey, president and CEO of the Georgia Association of Community Hospitals, cited a study his organization commissioned that found Georgia patients pay significantly less for health care than patients in states that don’t have a CON law.
Chris Dorman, president and CEO of Tifton-based Southwell, a health system that serves a dozen counties in south-central Georgia, said Medicaid expansion in Georgia – a proposal long resisted by Republicans – would help financially stretched rural hospitals stay open. He said 66% of Southwell’s emergency-room patients either have no health insurance or are underinsured.
House Minority Leader James Beverly, D-Macon, a member of the study committee, said the limited Medicaid expansion that Kemp pushed through the General Assembly – which took effect in July – isn’t putting a significant dent in the problem.
“We have a crisis on our hands right now because we haven’t used common sense to expand Medicaid,” Beverly said.
The study committee will hold a fourth and final meeting next month before developing recommendations for the full House to consider during the 2024 session.
ATLANTA – Gov. Brian Kemp is suspending the state sales tax on gasoline and other motor fuels for the second time in a year and a half, citing increasing prices at the pump.
The latest suspension will take effect at 12 a.m. Wednesday and run until 11:59 p.m. Oct. 12.
Kemp blamed the Biden administration for the latest rise in gasoline prices.
“From runaway federal spending to policies that hamstring domestic energy production, all Bidenomics has done is take more money out of the pockets of the middle class,” the governor said Tuesday. “While high prices continue to hit family budgets, hardworking Georgians deserve real relief, and that’s why I signed an executive order today to deliver it directly to them at the pump.”
Kemp first suspended the motor fuels tax in March of last year, shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine and subsequent sanctions on Russia drove gasoline prices in Georgia to a record high of more than $4 a gallon. He renewed the suspension each month until lifting it last January. During those months, Georgians saved about $1.7 billion.
Gasoline prices have crept up again over the summer. The average cost of a gallon of regular gas in Georgia currently is $3.57 per gallon, up from $3.24 a year ago, according to AAA.
Suspension of the gas tax will save Georgians 31.2 cents per gallon and 35 cents per gallon of diesel fuel.
Hunter Loggins, Georgia state director for the National Federation of Independent Business, praised the move to suspend the tax.
“The cost of fuel affects the cost of practically everything,” he said. “The average gas price in Georgia may be well below the record $4.50 a gallon set in the summer of 2022, but it’s still a lot higher than we were paying a year ago, and that leads to higher prices across the board.”
The rise in prices at the pump is being attributed to a combination of factors, including rising summer demand, a slowdown at oil refineries due to extreme summer heat, and recent production cuts by member nations of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).
Kemp said the state can afford to do without the gasoline tax revenue because of the huge budget surplus he has built up during the last three years. The state completed fiscal 2023 at the end of June with a surplus estimated at nearly $4.8 billion.
The Arch on the campus of the University of Georgia in Athens
ATLANTA – Georgia has landed two of its universities among the ranks of the top-10 public universities in the nation.
Georgia Tech is third in rankings platform Niche’s rankings of the 10 best public universities, while the University of Georgia placed ninth on the list.
The rankings, released last week, are based on an analysis of academics, admissions, financial, and student life data from the U.S. Department of Education. The ranking compares more than 500 public colleges and state universities.
The University of Georgia moved up one spot in the rankings, having placed 10th last year.
“The latest Niche ranking solidifying the University of Georgia’s position as a top national public university is yet another testament to the incredible work happening across UGA,” university President Jere Morehead said Monday.
“Our continued strategic investments in faculty hiring and enhancements of the living and learning experience for our undergraduate students are clearly making a very positive impact.”
The University of Florida was the only other school in the Southeastern Conference to make the top-10 list. The top public institution on the Niche rankings this year was the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA). The University of Michigan placed second in the rankings.
ATLANTA – After years on the back burner in the General Assembly, tort reform promises to be front and center when Georgia lawmakers convene in January for the 2024 legislative session.
Gov. Brian Kemp signaled his intention to push for changes in the state’s civil justice system last month when he addressed the Georgia Chamber of Commerce’s annual Congressional Luncheon in Athens.
“The laws on our books make it too easy to bring frivolous lawsuits against Georgia business owners, which drives up the price of insurance and stops new, good-paying jobs from ever coming to communities that need them the most,” Kemp declared.
“Next legislative session, I look forward to working with members of the General Assembly on legislation that provides much needed relief to countless small businesses and job creators, reduces insurance premiums for hardworking Georgians and their families, and treats both plaintiffs and defendants fair!”
Republicans have championed tort reform in the legislature for decades but were thwarted by Democrats back when they held majorities in both the state House and Senate. That changed in 2005 when the GOP captured control of both legislative chambers for the first time in modern history and passed a bill setting a $350,000 cap on non-economic damages in lawsuits.
But the state Supreme Court overturned the law in 2010. Since then, efforts to pass significant tort reform have failed to gain traction amid opposition from legislative Democrats and trial lawyers, who have argued changes to the system advocated by Republicans would strip away the rights of victims of car crashes and medical malpractice to their day in court.
That lack of progress continued this year when lawmakers supporting tort reform introduced seven bills. None made it to the floor of the House or Senate for a vote.
But Chris Clark, president and CEO of the Georgia Chamber, said several recent developments give him reason for optimism that the fortunes of tort reform may be about to change.
Clark pointed to the passage of major tort reform legislation in Florida earlier this year introduced by Ron DeSantis, that state’s governor and a Republican candidate for president. The bill expands immunity for property owners against lawsuits from criminals injured on their property and reduces the statute of limitations for general negligence cases from four years to two.
Closer to home, the American Tort Reform Association named Georgia the nation’s No.-1 “judicial hellhole” late last year in its annual report on states with the worst climate for tort claims.
Clark said that dubious distinction hurts Georgia’s claim to be the most business-friendly state in the U.S. a boast the state’s job recruiters trot out repeatedly to corporate prospects.
“We can’t be the best place in the country to do business with an unbalanced judicial system,” Clark said. “It’s time to do something about it.”
Clark also cited soaring auto insurance and medical malpractice insurance premiums in Georgia brought on by huge jury awards. He said a rash of “runaway” jury verdicts in the past year has prompted three auto insurance carriers to pull out of Georgia, while many health-care providers have turned to Europe for malpractice insurance.
But opponents of tort reform say business groups have manufactured a “lawsuit crisis” to convince lawmakers to pass reform legislation, exaggerating the problem by cherry-picking cases.
Madeleine Simmons, president of the Georgia Trial Lawyers Association, said civil lawsuit trials in Georgia require 12 jurors to reach a unanimous verdict in order for the trial judge to sign off on a verdict.
“In today’s political climate, if 12 strangers can agree on anything, it is nothing short of a miracle,” Simmons said. “The American jury system has proven to be the bedrock of our democracy, and Georgia’s civil justice system is no exception.”
Clark said the Georgia Chamber’s top priorities during the upcoming General Assembly session will include legislation doing away with “premise liability,” where property owners can be sued for crimes committed on their properties that they had nothing to do with, and prohibiting so-called “direct action” lawsuits in which insurance companies can be sued directly rather than the insured party.
“We’re one of only two states in the nation that allow direct action,” he said. “Let’s be in line with other states. We don’t want people [venue] shopping where Georgia is a target.”
The Georgia Chamber will have a new ally in 2024 in the fight for tort reform. A newly formed nonprofit coalition called Competitive Georgia unveiled late last month is vowing to champion the issue during the upcoming session.
