Applause for the employees on the Vermilion County Well being Division and Doug Toole, public well being administrator, for incomes the 2022 Bronze Progressive Observe Award from the Nationwide Affiliation of County and Metropolis Well being officers in recognition of the division’s efforts to battle the COVID-19 pandemic.
The division’s outreach applications to encourage native residents to obtain a COVID-19 vaccination together with establishing clinics at such non-traditional places as Danville’s Fischer Theatre.
The employees on the Fischer, volunteers, scholar nurses, native emergency medical technicians, native paramedics and members of the state’s Medical Reserve Corps helped with the native division’s efforts. Through the 10 vaccination clinics carried out on the Fischer, greater than 4,000 folks obtained the vaccine, based on the well being division.
“Over the course of the pandemic, we have been in a position to maintain vaccination clinics at our workplace, at Danville Space Group School, on the airport, at neighborhood facilities, at colleges, at church buildings, and at workplaces,” Toole mentioned in a press launch relating to the awards. “We’re appreciative of all of our hosts, however the clinics on the Fischer have been particular. It was an impressed concept.”
With the quantity of misinformation and political rhetoric that surrounded one of many largest threats to public well being in many years, the division’s constant and handy efforts to assist native residents keep secure stand out.
Regardless that such vaccination clinics not dot the schedule, the hazards surrounding COVID-19 stay. The Illinois Division of Public Well being reported 25,084 new instances of the virus in its weekly replace on Aug. 19. The report additionally mentioned within the interval of Aug. 12-19, 56 deaths within the state have been attributed to COVID-19.
Vermilion County stays at a medium stage of danger for COVID-19 as of Aug. 19. Aged residents or those that are immunocompromised ought to proceed to put on masks in public. And everybody ought to organize to be vaccinated or obtained the beneficial boosters to assist finish the unfold of the virus.
The virus has killed greater than 300 folks in Vermilion County for the reason that pandemic started within the spring of 2020. With out the Vermilion County Well being Division’s extraordinary efforts, that quantity can be a lot, a lot larger.
Congratulations to all those that labored so laborious to maintain all of us secure and wholesome.
