This story was updated at 8:48 p.m. on Sept. 22.

A Virginia House committee advanced a bill Tuesday that would make public the names of nursing homes and other group facilities experiencing outbreaks of infectious disease during a public health emergency.

The bill, which Health, Welfare and Institutions Committee Chair Del. Mark Sickles (D-Fairfax) patroned, would require the Virginia Department of Health to publish online the names of facilities, the number of confirmed cases and of deaths.

Current Virginia code requires facilities to report outbreaks only to their local health director or to the State Health Commissioner. In the early period of the pandemic, Virginia lawmakers from both parties called for the VDH to release more detailed information to the public, but it took months before Gov. Ralph Northam ordered the VDH to comply.

The 22-member bipartisan committee unanimously moved the bill forward.

Va. state Sen. Adam Ebbin (D-Alexandria) is bringing the same bill to the Senate.

The committee also moved forward a bipartisan bill that would provide parameters for nursing homes and other group facilities to facilitate visits via electronic devices when in-person meetings aren’t possible.

“There have been numerous cases where there have been facilities that said, ‘we don’t allow any sort of video in our facilities at all, you may not do this,’ and families were cut off,” said Del. Christopher Head (R-Botetourt). “You can’t just isolate the patients.”

The Democratic-controlled House committee tabled most other bills on its docket Tuesday, effectively striking them down. That includes a bill from Del. Ibraheem Samirah (D-Herndon) that would have expanded access to health care and set rate caps for health care charges.

“We don’t have money to pay for anything that’s got a recurring cost to it, for starters,” Sickles said.

The House committee also tabled a Republican-sponsored bill that would prioritize rapid diagnostic tests to certain essential workers such as firefighters, childcare workers, and those in law enforcement. Opponents say the tests are inaccurate and the bill excludes other classes of front-line workers like grocery store employees.

Limiting immunizations was similarly unpopular. The House committee tabled three bills that would have blocked the state from mandating  immunizations, including two sponsored by Del. Dave LaRock (R-Loudoun). The Committee also tabled a bill that makes it a punishable offense to make a false report of violation of health orders. Another tabled bill would empower businesses to appeal shutdown orders and demand monetary damages.

A bill to limit Board of Health emergency orders to 45 days was tabled as well. Further, the committee tabled a bill patroned by Mark Cole (R-Fredericksburg) that would have focused future emergency orders on protecting people who have an infectious disease and are contagious.

“We can’t pretend that these general orders don’t have significant health consequences,” Cole said. “Whenever you cause businesses to shut down, people lose their job, lose their health insurance, and earlier we even had a moratorium on elective procedures. And elective procedures include screening for cancer, things like that.”

His fellow committee members were quick to shut Cole down.

“The idea that somehow it was a bad idea to close businesses and try to flatten the curve is just wrong,” said Del. Dawn Adams (D-Richmond).

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to reflect that Del. Mark Sickles represents Fairfax County, not Arlington County.