County Health Department receives additional COVID-19 grant | COVID19

The Franklin County Health Department is working to raise more money to address the COVID-19 pandemic while at the same time spending more time on other health issues.

Part of the grant was announced after the budget prepared by the Department of Health for the Tuesday meeting with the County Commissioner was printed.

Through the Missouri Department of Health Senior Services (DHSS), the $ 637,244 Epidemiology and Laboratory Enhancement Detection and Expansion Grant is related to COVID-19 for contact tracing, testing, health education, vaccine response efforts, and data reporting. Funding. , Analysis and visualization.

“It must be used within the parameters of the health sector,” said Chair Tim Brinker.

The grant can be used for expenses from 1 July 2021 to 30 June 2023.

“It doesn’t have to be filled out in fiscal year 2021, but it covers chunks of answers from 2022 to half of 2023,” Health Director Angie Hittson told the commissioner. “But with that, we need a work plan, so there is a response effort we have to make.”

The funds can also be used to develop expertise, build infection prevention and control, and improve response to outbreaks.

According to the DHSS website, the grant is part of the $ 50.26 million distributed to the health sector throughout the state. Each division gets a base of $ 217,000 plus an additional amount based on population. That was $ 420,244 in Franklin County.

Franklin County also received more money than expected from COVID-19 and another grant dealing with adult vaccination. The grant has increased from the previously expected $ 182,913 to $ 263,555, partly due to the return of money by other health sectors, Hitson said.

Hitson said the county would have to spend the money until January 31, 2024.

Blinker told Hitson at the meeting to thank the staff for the controversy that had to be addressed, especially for the COVID-19 Quarantine Regulations. The district says it must follow the guidelines of the health sector, but Blinker said that Franklin County is limited by the state.

“Outside the virus, it’s now a political football, an emotional challenge from academic entities to parents to people in extracurricular lessons, and everything,” Blinker said. “Thank you for allowing it and working through it.”

Returning to other public health services is the greatest need for non-COVID for the health sector, Hittson told Brinker. This includes the provision of other vaccinations, including those not offered by all clinics.

“There are nurses who can immunize infants and children simply by resuming service (necessary),” she said. “COVID always seems to be a priority, so we have the ability to do everything (with grants).”

She said these efforts were hampered by the vaccine repellent rhetoric that came out for the COVID-19 vaccine. “For now, people feel a little more anti-vaccine, all vaccines,” she said. “So we are trying to balance it and open up the schedule.”

Blinkers have expressed concern about the spread of other diseases. “The last thing we need is something that manifests itself as a result of not providing anything else to young people, underprivileged people, or what may be in Franklin,” he said.

According to Hitson, cases of influenza are beginning to be brought to the health department, which provides vaccination against influenza.

“We are trying to have a temporary nurse there every day to bring in COVID and the flu (vaccine) so that other nurses can continue,” she said.

Hittson said some of the nurses are still busy with home-based COVID-19 vaccination, as well as school and corporate vaccination.