By: Rebecca Miller
On Friday, April 3, 2020 on the 9 a.m. phone Press Conference, which included the Community Health and Wellness Center (Bryan Hospital), Williams County Health Department Director of Nursing, Rachel Aeschliman, announced that the first “lab confirmed case” of COVID19 was identified on April 2, in Williams County, and had been announced by a press release that day.
At the press conference they were not free to give any other information concerning that, such as what town, male or female, where they are being treated or other info, just that, according to Health Commissioner James Watkins, “the diagnosed person is isolated and monitoring their symptoms, and we are working with them.”
Aeschliman explained that the Health Department did what is called “Contact Tracing” working with the Ohio Department of Health. As soon as they have a case reported, they begin a disease investigation, interviewing the individual and getting a list of all the people with whom they have been in contact in the days prior to the illness and while they have been ill.
This includes family members, co-workers and any others, so that those people can be notified and they can do what they need to do, which is to quarantine and monitor themselves for fourteen days. “ When an individual is diagnosed, or Lab Confirmed, they are instructed to isolate themselves and we keep working with them directly to stay on top of it,” Aeschliman said.
Daily, the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) and Ohio Health Department are updating their websites and Aeschliman suggested that anyone wanting numbers that are up to date, should check those two sites.
Watkins added that other sites are not as trustworthy as these two sites, and people should only check those, as others may not be correct. “Don’t get caught up in all the noise,” was how he expressed it.
Watkins pointed out that “the lab confirmed case is not the only case within the community.” He stressed that just because it is the only one confirmed it does not mean it is the only one and that everyone needs to keep strictly to the social distancing practices in place.
The importance of not “getting lax” in the way we all respond to this was expressed by Watkins, saying also “we must all remain vigilant in order to flatten the curve and protect our community.”
He also reiterated that the governor has extended the Stay at Home order to May 1st, and made it a rule now that people coming into the state for a visit and to stay, need to quarantine themselves for two weeks.
The Health Department is also working with businesses, following up on complaints and questions and will be “ramping that up” in the coming week. Any complaints or reports must be given to the Health Department by phone or email.
Once received, someone from the Environmental Health follows up to see if the business is non-essential or essential, or if a business is not following social distancing guidelines. They present a document that indicates how they fit the criteria.
At first, after the order, they saw around thirty complaints a day but that has slowed down. The businesses get a survey to show that they are in compliance. The Health Department does still get some everyday.
Public gatherings have also been reported and Watkins said that up till now they have not had specific directions, or a good method, on how to handle that yet. “Come Monday (April 6) the governor is going to be giving directions and we will know better how to handle those,” he said.
“Compliance has been good,” Watkins explained. “We are working with the Williams County Prosecutor to make sure we are doing it right.
Also, local law enforcement have been very helpful.” He added that everyone needs to remember this is a marathon, not a sprint and that we all need to do everything we can to keep the cases low.
Aeschliman shared that Ohio and New York’s numbers are being tracked by the Ohio State Health Deptartment. “Hopefully we are not going to end up like NY, because we took measures so early,” she said, and proceeded to share a metaphor given by Ohio State Health Director, Dr. Amy Acton.
Dr. Acton says we have had this category five hurricane coming in our direction, and we have known they are coming. But with these measures in place it has given us time to prepare and get ahead of it and it might be only a Category 3 instead of a Category 5 because we are more prepared than NYC was.
In terms of Ohio we have been on a trajectory for a Category 5 but by implementing these measures, we know we will be impacted, but we are flattening the curve.
The next two weeks are very critical. Community members need to follow the guidelines which will allow the health care facilities to build up their capacity and to slow the spread of the disease. Even after it peaks, there will still be high numbers and a need to stay at home for quite a while.
The General Order that is in place means that everyone should be careful everywhere, not concerned about what specific places might have the disease, but to treat every place as if they have a confirmed case.
Jess Hessgar, Marketing Specialist for CHWC, gave the following information from the hospital:
- Last week in Bryan a dedicated Covid-19 unit was established at CHWC that currently has 8 beds available and can go up to 26 beds. These beds are in addition to the normal 6 ICU beds.
- CHWC has also established an Emergency Department (ED) overflow in Bryan with 9 additional alternative care patient bays, in addition to the 13 regular care bays.
- Montpelier is establishing an ED overflow that will more than double their capacity and has converted two rooms to negative pressure rooms.
- At the moment CHWC has adequate N95 masks and supplies but have concerns for when the inpatient surge hits. They currently are in need of additional face shields and disposable gowns.
- They just started decontaminating masks and are starting to roll out reutilization in certain departments.
- CHWC is still screening all persons at the door with temperature taking and asking questions about travel, etc.
- As of Friday, April 3, 2020, CHWC had COVID-19 tested 46 persons with 40 results back — all negative. For those who desire updated numbers, they can be found at www.williamscountyhealth.org.
Present on the call were Health Commissioner James Watkins, Health Department Director of Nursing Rachel Aeschliman; CHWC President and CEOChad Tinkel, VP/Chief Information Officer Wade Patrick, Pathologist Dr. Shannon Keil, and Assistant VP of Ancillary Services Bobbi Case, as well as press representatives for The Village Reporter, The Bryan Times and Bryan Municipal Utilities.
Rebecca can be reached at publisher@thevillagereporter.com