San Antonio doctor and Democratic Texas House nominee Shelly Nickels expressed support for the Biden administration’s plan to threaten federal Medicare and Medicaid participation for hospitals and nursing homes that did not impose COVID-19 vaccine mandates on their employees.
Following further investigation into Nickels’ Facebook, it was revealed in a September 2021 Facebook post that Nickels praised the administration’s decision to use federal health care funding as leverage to require medical facilities to require their workers to receive the COVID-19 vaccine.
“Biden administration is planning on withholding Medicare funds from nursing homes (and now I have heard hospitals) who do not require their staff to be vaccinated against COVID,” Nickels wrote.
“I welcome this with open arms.”
Nickels’ post came as the Biden administration was dramatically expanding COVID-19 vaccine mandates. On September 9, 2021, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced that vaccination would become a requirement for employees at Medicare- and Medicaid-certified health care facilities nationwide. The requirement covered hospitals and nursing homes as well as dialysis facilities, home health agencies, and other medical providers.
Rather than simply encouraging health care workers to receive the vaccine, the administration tied compliance with its mandate to facilities’ eligibility for Medicare and Medicaid funding.
The policy was formally issued by CMS in November 2021 and ultimately applied to more than 17 million health care workers. For nursing homes, those remedies included monetary penalties, denial of Medicare and Medicaid payments, and ultimately termination from the programs. Hospitals that remained out of compliance could also face termination from participation in Medicare and Medicaid.
Nickels’ enthusiastic support for the policy is receiving renewed attention as additional social media posts from the physician’s COVID-era record come to light.
In another August 2021 Facebook post, Nickels described an encounter with an unvaccinated patient and his wife before asking, “At what point do we start arresting these literal murderers?”
Nickels is now seeking a seat in the Texas Legislature. She is the Democratic nominee for Texas House District 122, where she faces Republican incumbent State Rep. Mark Dorazio in the November 3 general election.