Humboldt County’s Public Health Officer Dr. Teresa Frankovich has been answering questions since the stay-at-home orders were instituted on a two question per media outlet roughly two to three times a week basis. The Emergency Operations Center takes the questions, and staff reads them on camera for her response. The resulting video, called a Media Availability, is then provided to news outlets at the end of the day.
Here are some of the main points covered in the July 24th Media Availability session with a summary of answers from Dr. Frankovich.
Media Question: Some local bus drivers are being allowed to take off their facial coverings while driving due to potential visibility impacts and safety concerns. Does this pose a concern from Public Health’s standpoint given the number of people who could potentially be exposed to an unmasked driver in a given day?
Answer by Dr. Frankovich:
Well, first of all, I would say you know I want both bus drivers to be protected, and the people around them to be protected. And so I think it’s important that everybody wear a facial covering as much as possible. Obviously we want drivers to be safe in their driving, that’s very important. However, I obviously would encourage bus drivers- there are lots of different kinds of masks that people can use- I get that some of them are problematic, fogging up your glasses, that type of thing. There are others that are better, and so I encourage them strongly to identify masks that work for them, that allow them to be safe in their workplace, and also help to contribute to the safety of the community in that fashion.
That being said, you know, it’s just particularly important in instances where people do not have a facial covering on, that we distance, so having that six-foot of distance between you know, individuals, is really helpful. Good ventilation is helpful, and all the other things that we’ve talked about.
1 mins 35 sec in:
Media Question: In recent weeks, you and Deputy Health Officer Josh Ennis have said repeatedly that social gatherings and travel have been largely responsible for local spread of the virus. As we submit this, we’ve seen three dozen new cases confirmed over the past 10 days. Has this pattern held and are most of these new cases linked to social gatherings and/or travel?
Answer by Dr. Frankovich:
So it’s a great question. And you know, without going and doing a case count I would say that certainly if you’re following our dashboard you know we’re not- we’re seeing some increase in community transmission cases, but a lot of others that are contacts and that are travel. And so it’s important for people to remember that, you know, only the original traveler is listed as the positive case, right, and under travel. And all of the people who become ill secondary to that are their contacts, and as well if we have an individual who comes to our area who is positive and exposes people locally, that individual is recorded as a positive in their own community. We are recording all the contacts to that person who become ill here, so I would say overall yes, a big driver of our local cases is related to both travel and to gatherings, and sometimes the two of those combined, and all of it goes to sort of increase the circulating prevalence of virus in our community. And we really need to be reducing that in order to be effective at controlling transmission.
3 mins 5 sec in:
Media Question: Are this week’s cases at all connected to the wedding/large gathering that took place in Petrolia 2 weeks ago? Does Public Health believe that the gathering is part of the reason we’ve seen an increase in cases lately?
Answer by Dr. Frankovich:
I don’t think any one particular gathering is the driver of what we’re seeing locally. I think gatherings as a whole are a big part of the driver, and are very important. And so remember that when you are part of a gathering, you might be a young healthy person, you might not get very sick but if you happen to work at a skilled nursing facility, or you happen to work in a jail or you happen to work in other congregate settings or with vulnerable Individuals, if you happen to have someone in your household who has immune status issues- you’re introducing risk into all those places and so it’s just really important not to do that.
3 mins 55 sec in:
Media Question: Given surging rates of infections and hospitalizations in other parts of the state and some counties’ inability to conduct sufficient contact tracing, some legislators and health experts have called on the governor to issue another statewide shutdown. Do you feel the state has crossed the threshold to where this may be necessary to contain the virus or do you think counties should be allowed to continue to exercise local control where conditions warrant?
Answer by Dr. Frankovich:
So I certainly understand the concern, and my understanding is that we have 34 counties now who are on the monitoring list. So their data suggests that there are some concerns there. We have been fortunate here in being able to you know, contain transmission to a large extent, and I, you know, at this point I would hate to see us put all the way back into shelter-in-place, because I think you know, locally our conditions don’t merit that right now.
I understand the problem of trying to navigate this epidemic for an entire state, and trying to make that work for everybody, but I certainly am not in any conversations right now about having shelter-in-place re-implemented here in the way we saw it at the beginning of the outbreak.
5 mins 10 sec in:
Media Question: National health experts have expressed optimism about the development of an effective coronavirus vaccine by the end of this year or early 2021. But at a recent Board of Supervisors meeting, Supervisor Rex Bohn said there may never be a vaccine for COVID-19 and you agreed that’s a possibility. How realistic do you think it is to expect to have an effective vaccine with lasting protection against COVID-19 in the near future?
Answer by Dr. Frankovich:
Well, you know, I think that it’s what we’re seeing to date is encouraging. I think there are certainly some candidates out there and I’m encouraged by the fact that we’re actually getting into some later study phases on vaccines, so is it possible that we will have an effective vaccine in early 2021? I think it’s possible. I think if we do, the supply of that vaccine is going to be an issue. And so that’s a consideration in terms of how quickly we would be able to protect the population, but again, unlike flu we have not produced a vaccine against a coronavirus before. This is new, and it takes a certain amount of time to be able to not only evaluate the safety of a vaccine, but its effectiveness, and so it is really, you know, we will… we may have a vaccine before we know for certain that it will provide long-term protection, so it’s a constantly moving landscape here but I do think it’s on our horizon to have a candidate a vaccine to try.
The other thing I do want to point out though, is that, you know, while vaccine is an important piece of ending what we’re currently doing around this pandemic and getting, you know, kind of back to normal- a good therapeutic is also something that would change this entirely. If we find something that works well to prevent severe illness and death, it’s a complete game-changer and so I am hopeful that we will identify something like that. That may also help us address this more quickly than you know a year or two down the road.
7 mins 20 sec in:
Media Question: Can you give an update on PPE available in the county for healthcare workers and medical staff? Is additional PPE being sent out to nursing homes and assisted living facilities too?
Answer by Dr. Frankovich:
So, the personal protective equipment (PPE), we do as a county try and support entities in having PPE available in general. Most facilities look to purchase commercial protective equipment, and the county provides sort of a safety net on that, and just helps to make sure everybody’s robust at the same time. So yes, we do provide continued PPE.
I believe first responders, we provide on sort of a monthly basis to make sure they’re whole, and then we work with our facilities on an every two week basis, we monitor their supplies ongoing so that we’re aware of what is out there because that’s part of our preparedness. And then we work with them to either help identify additional resources or we help to put it in place there right away.
8 mins 25 sec in:
Media Question: Are you still distributing PPE to first responders, if so, how often?
Answer by Dr. Frankovich: Yeah, we just answered that.
8 mins 35 sec in:
Media Question: Previously we reported on free Antibody testing to detect previous exposure to COVID 19 that was made available at one local clinic. Are Antibody tests reliable, and will they become readily available to the general public?
Answer by Dr. Frankovich:
So, I think antibody tests are great, but they are of no use in diagnosing an infection. So if you’re ill, the antibody test is not what you need- you need a diagnostic test. Antibody tests are meant to tell us whether we’ve had an exposure to the virus previously.
I think the test technology is actually pretty good. I think that the utility of the test in terms of its predictive value is the problem. We really just don’t know what it means if we detect an antibody whether it’s giving you protection or not if it does for how long, and what level of antibody you need to be protected. We know our immune system is made up of other pieces besides antibodies alone and so even though we might see a decline in antibodies in a person, it could be that the other pieces of your immune system are primed and ready and so part of this is going to just take time. We’ll be able to monitor people’s antibodies levels over time we’ll be able to see who gets protected and who doesn’t and that will help us figure out the best path forward.
9 mins 45 sec in:
Media Question: Do you know, are COVID-19 particles destroyed via refrigeration or contact with the sun?
Answer by Dr. Frankovich:
I’m not aware of either of those things being a useful method to destroy COVID,and so I think all the things we talked about- the hand washing, hand sanitizer, cleaning- all of those things are important as well as the distancing and facial use of facial coverings.
I did want to point out on the previous question, I didn’t address the issue about availability of the antibody tests. The antibody tests, there are entities, some of the commercial labs do offer antibody testing. There are some providers here who are able to order that. There are some entities locally that do antibody testing on site so people can talk to their healthcare provider if they’re interested in having that one. I’m not aware of any free antibody testing available.
10 mins 45 sec in:
Media Question: Should people still seek non-emergency medical care and go to routine medical appointments at this time?
Answer by Dr. Frankovich:
I think it’s really important. You know, certainly we are seeing an increase in cases, and I know, you know, that’s a concern. But I think that as we move forward through the COVID landscape we are going to see that increase, rather than decrease substantially. I think that’s certainly the trend, and so I think if you need some routine health care maintenance done, I think it’s an important time to just get in and do it.
I think our health care Facilities have really worked hard to create a safe environment inside their facilities. So I’d really encourage people to talk to their healthcare provider about what they need right now and try and get that scheduled.
11 mins 25 sec in:
Media Question: How close is Humboldt to being on the monitoring list, are we at all close?
Answer by Dr. Frankovich:
So, people may be aware, there are several factors that contribute to going on to the monitoring list, and I would say that in terms of our healthcare capacity, that type of thing, we’re doing okay right now. I think that the measurement that we would be closest on would be our case rate, and so what we notice with that, is that in order to go on the list we need a case rate of 25 per 100,000 people. I believe it’s…either over 7 or 14 day period that they do an average, and in our case and you would also need to have a positivity percent of 8 or greater. In our instance, we’ve been riding around that 25 number and have exceeded it at times, but our percent positivity has remained well below 8 at this time. So I would say that we are not imminently going on to that list, but the increasing case count does concern me, and I’d rather see us going in the other direction so that we can assure the things that we have open and available to people remain that way, and that our healthcare system is protected.
Community members with questions or concerns are encouraged to call 441-5000 for additional information.
Local information is also available online at humboldtgov.org or during business hours by contacting [email protected] or at the Humboldt County COVID-19 Data Dashboard: humboldtgov.org/dashboard
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Dr. Frankovich Talks About Current COVID Concerns, Humboldt County's Risk Level, Antibody Testing and More - Redheaded Blackbelt
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