Coronavirus
Harder visits Modesto to assess Stanislaus County’s coronavirus preparedness
As the state and federal governments begin preparing for a medical surge, Rep. Josh Harder visited the Stanislaus County Office of Emergency Services center on Wednesday to learn about the county’s preparedness.
“I know that we have a lot of folks working overtime in this emergency center,” said the Congressman from Turlock. “We want to make sure the general public understands all of the hard work going into this (response) from our county.”
OES responsibilities include informing the public, ensuring sufficient medical supplies and that the county health care infrastructure is prepared to surge its capacity to meet the demand for medical care for county residents, related or not to COVID-19.
Richard Murdock, assistant deputy for emergency services and fire warden for Stanislaus County, said the main objective of OES is getting fact-based messages to the community.
Since the current threat is an infection, county public health is leading the OES response, but all county departments are involved.
“At this point, we have full faith and confidence in our public health officer, (Dr. Julie Vaishampayan),” said Murdock, “We’ll do what she says it’s time to do.”
For example, he said, the scientific evidence does not support a “shelter-in-place” policy in Stanislaus County, as observed in Fresno County and seven Bay area counties, among others in California.
Communication to and from OES
Murdock said one of the biggest difficulties for getting messages to the community is the rapid flow of information from the state and federal government, which is often not communicated to the county in a timely fashion.
“There’s information coming from both the governor’s office and the president and sometimes we’re the last ones to hear that information,” said Murdock.
He said this leaves the public thinking OES isn’t taking action, though they are doing all they can to get scientifically proven information to county residents.
Murdock said people hear promises on television from state and federal officials and think that those things, such as mobile testing, are then immediately available in the county. But, that’s not the case, it can take days or even weeks before things get to the local level.
He said all information from OES to county residents has been vetted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) or California Dept. of Public Health.
“We’re updating www.stanemergency.com as well as the sheriff’s media sites to get the information out,” said Murdock.
They are also working with the county’s center for aging, which already has a network in place to deliver information to the elderly.
The emergency operations center is staffed from 8 a.m. until 7 p.m., with the overnight calls covered by United Way’s 211 information line with backup from on-call OES personnel.
County’s preparedness
The response to the novel coronavirus has required rapid and flexible shifting of resources, as new information emerges, including data from China, South Korea and Italy.
Those three countries are part of the earliest, and hardest hit, areas and they needed to surge their health care system. They have had successes and failures in meeting the demands, as discussed in blog from the Brookings Institute.
“Medical surge” is defined as the ability of a health care system to provide medical care during major events that exceed the limits of the normal medical infrastructure of an affected community, according to the U.S. Dept. of Health & Human Services.
Harder asked about the county’s surge capacity, but that information wasn’t immediately available, though the state and federal governments have begun steps for surge.
On Tuesday, Gov. Newsom discussed the state’s preparedness for expanding health care work force and equipment, including ventilators. He also discussed the statistical models used to estimate the different case scenarios for the potential number of COVID-19 victims in California. One of the worst-case scenarios predicts the need to hospitalize an excess of 20,000 patients.
Harder said that “we have a public health emergency that is rapidly evolving into an economic crisis..”
Yet, his first priority “is addressing the public health emergency as soon as possible.”
“There needs to be a stimulus package to get our economy back on track.” he said. “I think things like direct payments to folks are a good idea, but our No. 1 priority has to be addressing the public health emergency.”
Harder said that the House of Representatives passed the Family First Coronavirus Response Act with three priority areas, including funding to get more viral testing to the public, ensuring adequate medical supplies, such as personal protective equipment for front line responders and providing paid sick leave, helping with some financial security for individuals and businesses with fewer than 500 employees.
The bill was passed by the U.S. Senate on Wednesday and later signed by President Trump.
“What I’ve heard from leaders in the county is they want to be hearing quickly and directly from Sacramento and Washington,” said Harder. “I’m going to take to Washington that we need to get information to the people who need it, and that we have to get them resources.”
his story was produced with financial support from The Stanislaus County Office of Education and the Stanislaus Community Foundation, along with the GroundTruth Project’s Report for America initiative. The Modesto Bee maintains full editorial control of this work.
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