Nurses treat a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) patient in the ICU at SSM Health St. Anthony Hospital in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, U.S., January 28, 2021. REUTERS/Nick Oxford

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(Reuters) - Bayada Home Health Care Inc has lost a bid to escape a lawsuit by a former nurse who says she was fired after complaining that employees were not given adequate protection against COVID-19 and told to conceal possible exposures to the virus from patients.

U.S. District Judge Mitchell Goldberg in Philadelphia ruled Thursday that Michelle Chiancone could go forward with a claim for wrongful termination, though he dismissed a separate claim she brought under Pennsylvania's whistleblower law.

Lawyers for Chiancone and New Jersey-based home health care provider Bayada did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

According to her October 2020 lawsuit, Chiancone, a Delaware resident, was hired by Bayada to provide hospice and palliative home care in Pennsylvania in March 2019. Chiancone said that, when the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020, she observed unsafe and in some cases illegal practices.

She said that the company gave nurses only three masks, which were not high-quality N95 masks, and instructed them to wear the masks...

Read Full Story: https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/bayada-must-face-lawsuit-by-fired-nu...