St. Joseph's Hospitals Loosen Visitor Rules Amid Decline In COVID Hospitalizations

PASSAIC COUNTY, NJ — Citing a steady decline in patients hospitalized with COVID-19, St. Joseph's Health loosened visitor restrictions Friday at its Wayne and Paterson hospitals.

As of Friday, St. Joseph's has the following policy:

• All non-COVID patients can have one visitor at a time.
• Pediatric patients may have two parents or guardians visit at the same time, unless COVID-positive. Patients-under-investigation guidelines apply.
• COVID-positive patients cannot have visitors.
• All visitors must check in at the main lobby's reception desk and wear a face mask at all times.

Visiting hours are 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. See detailed guidelines here.

The restrictions follow guidance from the New Jersey Hospital Association, which developed a color-coded system to direct visitor policies to reduce COVID-19 risk. "Red" indicates no visitors with few exceptions, "yellow" means limited visitation and "green" loosens restrictions the most but leaves some limits.

The NJHA updated visitation levels Wednesday, placing North Jersey counties in the yellow and nine South Jersey counties in the red.

During the omicron-variant wave, New Jersey peaked Jan. 11 at 6,089 hospital patients with confirmed or suspected COVID-19. The number of COVID-19 patients has declined since to 2,409 as of Thursday.

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