Kane County Reporter

Rep. Dan Ugaste (R-St. Charles) took to the House floor on April 4 in support of Senate Bill 1405, which would require nursing homes and other health care facilities to allow at least one visitor to visit residents/patients in the event of public health emergencies.

"There are those in this state who did not get to see their loved ones for months on end once this pandemic started prior to that family member passing away. My wife was one of those people," Ugaste said. "She didn't get to see her mother for three and a half months prior to her mother passing away. She got to go in and see her when her mother was completely comatose and say a final goodbye. That was it. These are ladies who would speak three times a day, only for the purpose of saying hello to each other. That's how close they were. If you had any idea - any idea - what that does to an individual - as I've watched my wife go through this for the past two years since her mother passed away - you would vote for this bill. Because that is inhumane, in and of itself. It's not about governors' powers, it's not about executive authority. I'm happy to have that discussion with anyone. This bill's completely different.”

Senate Bill 1405 would require nursing homes and other health care facilities to allow residents or patients to have at least one visitor in the event of public health emergencies in Illinois. A clergyperson would not count as the one visitor. Visitors could be subject to health screenings prior to entering the health care facility.

State Sen. Dan McConchie (R-Lake Zurich) is the primary sponsor of the legislation. SB 1405 would amend the Medical Patient Rights Act, removing language that gave total power to health care facilities to regulate and restrict hours of visitation or the number of visitors per patient.

Fox News reported earlier this year on a Libertyville family whose grandfather passed away alone in a hospital. His family was not allowed to visit him because of the hospital's visitor policy. “He’s everything to our family and he should have been surrounded by people he loved,” one of his grandchildren told Fox.