Concern around Covid-19, also known as the coronavirus, brought Greenbrier County together for a public health briefing. Led by Greenbrier County Commission President Lowell Rose, representatives from organizations spoke to the response plan if the coronavirus breaks out in Greenbrier County and offered advice for the public to monitor their own health.
“The problem with this virus is that people are scared,” said Dr. Caroline Bridgett Morrison. “Our hope today is to dispel the fear. One of the biggest questions I’m asked on a daily basis is ‘where do people need to go and get tested?’ If we really think about it, most people don’t need to be tested. … This, for the most part, causes flu-like symptoms. We’re still in flu season and treating lots of people with the flu. [For] coronavirus, almost 90 percent of people have cold-like symptoms and they’re mild.”
Morrison spoke to when a person should seek care, emphasizing that any trip to a hospital or to a physician should be called in ahead of time, allowing them to prepare to take in a patient rather sitting in the waiting room, potentially exposing more people.
“When do you need to seek medical care? When you have a fever you can’t control. Obviously if you get short of breath,” Morrison said. “If you have symptoms that are severe, call your medical provider, let them know what your symptoms are. In that process, if they tell you to come in, [telling them your symptoms] allows them to be prepared, because we don’t want other people exposed. … If a patient is sick and they don’t alert anybody and they go into the clinic or the [emergency room] without any masks, they can infect everyone else. If someone is sick and they’re coming into a healthcare facility, we’re encouraging them to put a mask on. … One of the things we don’t want you to do is run to the [emergency room], unless you’re having shortness of breath, unless you’re really sick, and [in that case, call] and let them know [you’re coming] as well.”
Mass testing in Greenbrier County is not currently expected.
“A lot of the illnesses that we encounter, both in clinics and in hospitals, is viral and we never really know exactly what it is,” Morrsion said. “We just know we treat people and they get better. With that being said, we’re testing people for the flu first for good reason. … If we have a patient that meets the criteria, we’re going to be testing the patient, when we know exactly what we’re treating then that’s the best care.”
“We didn’t have enough test kits and, until Monday of this week, our state lab was the only one testing in West Virginia,” explained Greenbrier County Health Department Director of Nursing/Administrator Nikki Dolan. “Beginning Monday of this week, it began opening up to the commercial labs, so I think we’ll see more testing now.”
If a person does not have health insurance or cannot afford medical bills, Dolan noted the Health Department and other medical agencies have sliding scales, allowing for flexibility in treatment.
“They should isolate until they become sick enough to need medical attention,” emphasized Dolan. “The health department works on a sliding scale fee, for those under or not insured … it’s pretty affordable. Right now Rainelle Medical center … offers sliding scale fees that are affordable for those. We can test and when we send the test to the state lab, for flu or the … panel that tests for 21 other viruses, or the corona, it’s sent to the state lab at no charge.”
Greenbrier County Homeland Security and Emergency Management Director Mike Honaker explained the agency’s “real goal … is education and response. We’re doing the best we can do to educate people about what they should do and the best possible way to not contract coronavirus.”
“It seems the greatest, newest trend in the medical profession is to wash our hands, right? Who knew coming up to his point that we would need to wash our hands?” joked Honaker. “I would hope it’s something we’ve been doing for a long time.”
Honaker emphasized hand washing not only after coming into contact with someone, but after interacting with something that changes hands often, such as money, the gas pump, grocery store carts, and other public use items.
According to the CDC, the most effective means to prevent the spread of any respiratory virus, including flu, are:
• Washing hands often with soap and water for at least 20 seconds. Use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer if soap and water are not available.
• Covering the mouth and nose with a tissue or sleeve (not hands) when coughing or sneezing.
• Avoiding exposure to others who are sick.
• Staying home when you are ill.
The potential for school closures was also addressed – Senator Stephen Baldwin spoke to his impression of West Virginia Department of Education’s response after he attended a briefing earlier that day.
“The impression I got is [the Department of Education] does not at this point foresee any school closures,” explained Baldwin. “They talked about how young people are disproportionately not affected by the coronavirus [Covid-19] and also how important schools are to the community and to the economy. I got the impression from the superintendent that they would do everything possible to keep schools open, to the extent that was possible.”
Looking at the situation in Greenbrier County Schools, nurse Paula McCoy gave a summary of the school’s current position on closures.
“We have been synthesizing information, … trying to decide what we’re going to do as a county,” said McCoy. “We are most concerned with our students and with their families. … We’ve worked on some guidelines on that, put a plan in writing. It needs to be approved by our board members and that has not happened yet. We hope to have it to our families by the end of the week – it has specific guidelines for if we close schools. We address field trips, child nutrition, education for families, because it’s multifaceted.”
Other factors, such as working parents who rely on school’s to watch their children as they go to work and potential familial exposure, are also being considered by the Board of Education.
“We are very aware too of our grandfamilies. … [About] 70 percent of grandparents have at least some responsibilities, and many of them full responsibility, for raising their grandchildern and, as we know, that’s the high-risk group that could have a negative effect if they caught the coronavirus [Covid-19],” McCoy said. “So we’re considering all of those things as we put our plan together.”
In the case of a closure, the schools are expected to operate on a modified reimagined time day schedule. In addition, plans for providing food to students that rely on school to eat are currently in the works, but are not finalized.
“[In typical reimagined time days], if we close schools, staff reports on those days and the students have written instructions they do at home,” McCoy explained. “If we are required to close school [for coronavrius], staff will not report and will need to practice social distancing. Our students will have packets of materials to do at home. … It’s designed [to do] without a lot of assistance because it’s mostly review of material that they have studied. Reimagined time would take on a new reality if we have to close for coronavirus”
Along side Greenbrier County Schools, West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine (WVSOM) President James Nemitz spoke to the school’s efforts to monitor the spread of the virus.
“We’ve been obtaining our guidance from CDC, the state, and from the local health department, those are our main sources of information and we’re sharing that with our facilty, staff, and students through emails,” said Nemitz. “We’re creating a webpage so you’ll be able to go to our website and get some basic information.”
Nemitz explained that response has been left up to individual higher education institutions, giving WVSOM options on how to handle things moving forward. A mass email detailing the school’s response is expected to be released after the Wednesday meeting.
“The response by institutions across the state have been left up to the institutions, we have not been mandated,” Nemitz said. “WVU, Marshall, Sheppard, and Concord have come out with statements and we’ll be coming out with ours. … We are basically suspending nonessential domestic travel, we’re going to suspend international travel. We’re going to ask people where they’re traveling, because we have concerns for when they come back on campus. We’re going to provide guidance about if they have to travel for personal reasons. … We have a spring awards ceremony on April 3, we’re going to be canceling that. … Right now it’s just not a good idea to bring people together. We’re looking at what to do with our classroom situation and our labs. … We haven’t made a decision yet on graduation, we’re hoping things can die down a bit before graduation. It’s one of those things, it’s ongoing. Both my community as well as the community in general [has to understand this] is an ever-evolving situation and things are going to change and some of the recommendations are going to change.”
A major concern from the public was the potential economic impact of the virus, quarantines, and people staying home. This does not just include residents – the largest industry in Greenbrier County is tourism. Noting that the county is having a good tourism year so far, Kara Dense, executive director of the Greenbrier County Convention and Visitors Bureau, explained how Covid-19 could affect countywide visitation.
“Aside from the virus itself, the impact of this could and is going to have on this county’s economy is crucial,” said Dense. “It’s going to be bad. As you know, The Greenbrier has 720 rooms and they depend mostly on group business and they’re already having groups that are looking to cancel. It can have just a huge effect on us, so we’re going to continue to do our marketing and encourage people to come here. People are still going to want to get away and our hope is that maybe we can get them to come here and enjoy the fresh outdoors and get away from the larger cities.”
The potential for closing several upcoming outdoor events, such as the Lewisburg Chocolate Festival and the West Virginia Brew Festival hosted by the State Fair of West Virginia (SFWV), is being considered, with SFWV CEO Kelly Tuckwiller-Collins asking “who on the county [or state] level would make that call?”
“That guidance would probably be handed down from the state to the local levels, depending on disease statistics in our community,” Dolan responded.
Rose also pointed to the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources.
“They mainly give suggestions, not mandates, so they leave it up to your discretion, but they strongly suggest sometimes,” said Theresa White, the regional liaison officer for the West Virginia Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management.
Senator Stephen Baldwin and delegates Cindy Lavender-Bowe and Jeff Campbell attended the meeting, giving an update to the situation coming from the state legislature.
“In the budget that just passed there was a $2 million fund that was for advance cost,” Baldwin said. “The thought is there will eventually be federal dollars flowing, but [we were] advised there would be upfront costs that would not be covered, so that $2 million fund was set up.”
Following the meeting, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced it would be providing the state with $5 million to West Virginia to deal with the potential impact of an outbreak.
Plans for a countywide, centralized, coordinated response were preliminarily set, with the Gwen Clingman Center in Lewisburg able to serve as a potential headquarters. Rose thanked the Health Department and Tia Humphreys for their work in coordinating the event, which Baldwin further commended.
“One more thing I think you all need to hear, positive sermon, [is that] I was sharing with some state level folks that this was happening here and they were pleasantly surprised that this was happening on a county level,” Baldwin said. “Y’all are leading yourselves here today, … I think this, in and of itself, is a great start.”
During the briefing, Honaker spoke to his experiences working in emergency response before coming to Greenbrier County.
“I remember being at the Pentagon on 9/11 and we thought it was the end of the world and the stock market, how bad it got, as well as the economy in general,” Honaker said. “But, gosh, America is so resilient. That’s not a word we use enough. We do in our business, because we talk about responding and recovery … but I remain an optimist that this wind is going to blow for the next month. There will probably turn out to be a few more cases that are positive, but then it’s going to be remarkable to see the bounce back and how, once it’s over, the sense of relief is going to bring people to The Greenbrier and this community, the chocolate festival, and all the things at the state fairgrounds. … We prepare for the worse and hope for the best, and that’s what we’re doing right now.”
Read more in the Thursday, March 12, 2020, edition of The West Virginia Daily News.
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