R-53 COVID and Department of Health
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What was said
Machine transcription of 20m of recording, with speaker names inferred from voice matching. 35% of 52 lines carry a name. It shows what was said, not what was decided, and both the words and the names can be wrong.
We've got three things going here. So we are gonna move on to the regular agenda. And um I see R fifty three.
It's been so long since we've seen Mike, we wanted to invite him back again.
Yeah.
But Good morning, Commissioners. It's great to be back in front of you in different circumstances. Mike Napier, Florida Department of Health, Trang Chittacom 108-41 Little Road, Newport Ritchie. Uh We're here to talk to you a little bit about COVID, just a little bit, and a little bit more about the health department. Um next slide. Or well I guess we got that there. We're gonna talk a little bit about the COVID response. Uh believe it or not, it's been a little over two years
now, and uh we have a slide or two to talk a little bit about what all happened. But also what I really wanted the takeaway from COVID is is that um we wouldn't have been here standing here today if it wasn't for our community partners. Each of you helping me and the rest of the community identifying uh supporters. Locations, vaccination sites, uh many of you called at one point in time where, hey, we're not getting our share of vaccine. You called those to powers to be to make sure we got vaccine here. So uh
just gonna talk a little bit about that, and then we're gonna talk a little bit about uh our um uh what we're doing going forward. The slide here is a little bit hard to see, but what I what I really want you to do do is there's three years of data here. The blue data, the the the light blue data was when COVID first started.
They were excited about your speech. Yeah, one is glad that uh or maybe the recovery. Um so the first the small bar graph to the right is the light blue, and that was when COVID started. And and if you look in the middle, that light blue is actually when um the board here we made the decision that uh we were gonna start shutting down businesses. And we were wearing masks and schools were closed. And and that's that first middle blue line, the small blue line. And that goes to the right through the rest
of that that calendar year. Um the yellow line, which is the next year, which is 2001, kind of tells you a little different story about what happened as far as uh COVID cases. Um I also point out that uh in that yellow line where you see on the left hand side the yellow underneath the taller blue is when vaccine first became available.
Oh interesting.
Uh as you can see the yellow line goes through. We had the delta variant come in, and that's where in the center of the map is when the delta variant arrived. And uh you can see the long the the it took about two months to go through the Delta variant. And um and then it came down again once people were vaccinated, who either got sick or got vaccinated. And then uh the d the darker blue, which is on the left hand side, is the Omicron. And I draw the distinction between the Delta and the Omicron in the the the uh Delta
was a longer period of time and not quite so high. Whereas the Omicron was highly infectious. but a short period of time. And on that peak period, uh Pasco County had eighteen hundred dose uh eighteen hundred cases in a single day. with thirty-five percent of the c um testing that came back was positive. So one in three people that went and got tested, didn't feel well, was getting tested, were coming back positive. So just trying to keep perspective on uh where we were. And if you look at
the dark blue to the left quarter of the graph, that's where we are today. Like I said, we had 17 cases and a 2.8% positivity yesterday. A long cry from eighteen hundred and and Thirty four hundred per thirty four percent positivity. As a reminder as well, vaccinations. When we had limited vaccine, the health department was the lead agency for the county on getting vaccinations out to the sites. Uh we had those at Sears and at
um At Saint Leo. Uh couldn't have been done without partners that I'm gonna talk about in a little bit. And we also have testing sites. I just want to map those out. Anytime you want to know where those sites are, if you go to the Floridahealth.cov FloridahealthCovid19.gov, they're changing from time to time. You can get that information.
The goal here is to talk a little bit about what our vaccination rates are. For the state of Florida, we're about 70%. Uh in in Pasco we're about 64%. But I would draw your attention to the graph to the right, which is actually showing that uh our vulnerable population, 60 and older, are about 85, almost 90%, 95% vaccinated. And that's what the target audience was all along. Uh you're County Administrator and I, when we first started talking about vaccination rates, uh
our goal was sixty percent. And so uh We're at sixty-four percent today and and uh glad that that that we're in that position.
Um kind of the after action um that we talk about Locally, we had consistent messaging. Outside of the locally, we all talked amongst ourselves. We tried to have a solid message for our community. The outside factors certainly uh affected us, but our messaging, I've spoken to every one of you multiple times a week many times about where we were at with hospitals, testing, vaccinations, and and I can't thank you enough for that level of support. Whether it was having to make calls that I couldn't make to those who could
get me vaccine or facilities. The collaboration with the school district, which where they've got 50,000 students affected by COVID, the school district setting up a command center there with Mr. Browning and his staff was was instrumental in our success. Cooperation with other local entities and municipalities. We had conference calls, they would email me, we set up particular sites. Um and I just want to point out also that that with 132
employees at the health department, we hired another 75 people to help with COVID. So we nearly have the amount of people. Now hiring people is not the hard part is training people to make phone calls. How do you do contact tracing? So it was a learning curve for us to try to train that many people in that short of time. And then the last thing with the county emergency management, uh I honestly I couldn't have made it without Andy and his team helping us because they covered the regional logistics materiel staffing
and it was we couldn't have made it without County EM.
A few thank yous that I want to mention and I and if you take a look at the pictures in there, the uh top right corner one is at Sears where where uh I wanna give a shout out to Eric and his team. Mm my staff and the people who worked out at that uh drive-thru dri I couldn't have made it without those tents. It was intense heat, cold, whatever it was, but having them put that out there. But I wanna as I mentioned the county management team emergency management. Baycare was instrumental. I want to make sure that Baycare was instrumental on the testing side.
Early on when we were trying to find tests and where could we get material to test and get the returns back, Baycare was right there side by side with us at golf uh elementary uh golf high school when we first started and then at Sears. And so I mentioned the golf high school staff that were out there, the principal, the Golfview Square Mall was helpful in making sure we had a location for a long period of time that people knew we had parking, we had ability to get people in and out. And lastly and and and probably uh as impressive to have the St. Leo University
step up. With the amount of people and staffing that helped us and having the drive thru at uh Saint Leo was was and the fact that they had the uh parking garage there to allow us to uh get out of the weather. Uh I know Commissioner Oakley came out and and actually did a visit and saw what that operation was. It was pretty impressive with what the school was willing to offer to us. Uh we have in the near future a plaque to be able to to uh uh a bronze plaque to actually put on that parking garage to remember um commemorate
all that had happened there. Um so it was um Yeah, we're not out of the woods yet, uh entirely. We still hear about covet, but I think that for right now I think we're the health department's ready to move on with our our sites still on COVID, but uh Um we're ready to move on and I'm gonna have Trang talk a little bit about what that might look like.
Hi, good morning.
Thank you for having us here today. And um while COVID has impacted much of our lives in the last couple of years, we are excited to see what's going forward. And this past year we were able to, with the help of the county, we are able to procure a larger building on the west side of the county using state funds. And we're looking forward to being able to move into that new building next year. At this new building,
we will be able to provide a one-stop shop for all of our services, which will be very exciting for our residents. Now, currently we have five locations in the county, and our new building will consolidate Main Street and Little Sh Little Road into one larger building where we'll be able to provide the family planning services, immunizations, infectious disease treatment, along with Wick and Healthy Start Services. An added feature in the new building, we've partnered
with our Premier, our federally qualified health center, who will be providing dental services in our new building. So we're really excited about this new building. The health department operates on a $14.5 million budget, which $1 million of it is currently COVID funding. We have, as Mike mentioned, about 130 staff, but 25 of those staff is currently working COVID operations at the moment. In
the last year, we've provided 180,000 services to the community while seeing about 14,000 clients with with all of the services that we provide. And I wanted to take a moment to thank our staff. As Mike mentioned, we could not have done it without them, especially in this last year. So in December we took a satisfaction survey, and we're happy to present that 90, over 90% of our staff responded
back with positive results. With all the chaos and uncertainty that happened within the last couple of years, our staff at the health department was no different. They've endured, you know, being homes, family sickness, friend sickness, being isolated, quarantine, uh, school closures, um, all while having to still come into work every day. And so with communication, and compassion we're able to push through and we're
happy to present our positive satisfaction results now. And we're looking forward to what's to come in the future.
Now beyond COVID we we've also working on some additional um activities that I wanted to share with you. Uh a couple years ago we received an opioid grant that we were able to partner with our Sheriff's Office and our school board to provide and enhance some of the programs that they have addressing opioid use in our county. We're also a part of the opioid task force team preparing a plan and a framework for the upcoming
funds to address the opioid use and substance disorders in Pasco County and we're looking forward to working on those efforts.
We've also partnered with our regional county health departments and completed a survey, a community health needs assessment survey, where we will take a look at our tentative top top topics in the next upcoming years, which will address access to care. Exercise, nutrition and weight, mental health, and mental disorders within the county.
And finally, we've completed a protocol for assessing community excellence and environmental health. The department has completed at least three of these surveys in previous years. And in past years, we worked with Parks and Recs to assess residents' use of the parks and why don't they use the parks, and we're able to provide some of the responses there to the Parks and Recs group. A couple years ago, we did an assessment of the Moon Lake area, and
we were able to to prov provide some new equipment to the park in that area. And then recently we did an assessment to assess the needs in the holiday area. And we look forward to presenting those results to you.
And finally, we are extremely thankful for the relationship that we have with you all and the support that you've given us, especially in the last couple of years.
Madam Chairman
Mariano.
Thank you, Madam Chairman M I tell you what, you know You guys are awesome. You're incredible. You're you you you really are. I I say I have the honor but of being chair during the when this all kicked off, but You know, it's it's funny and and then divorce bad
You guys again, we're just just amazing during this time and you know, you and your entire team literally working twenty four seven. I mean you still haven't gotten any rest. Maybe one day you will, hopefully soon. But you know, our f our family dynamic was interesting because hearing being a county commissioner and in the chair at that time, talking to Mike on a daily basis and as we know the Jaron Moskowitz and and trying to get the the vaccines and the tests and things down here. But my wife also
was very involved and worked with train c um not only on the covet side of things, but she o was also the one you talked about, the opioid grant. My wife was the lead for the Pasco County School System on that opioid grant. So they work very closely together. So she might she she may have been on the phone with training and I was on the phone with Mike at the same time. But um You know, now she's moved on and she's teaching university, but she enjoyed her time she spent with obviously working together with you guys too. But you know, again, I I just wanted to say thank
you, you know, so so very much for everything you do. Not just during COVID, but ongoing. You know, the importance of your of the full Department of Health here in Pasco County is is extraordinary. I mean it's it's it's beyond The work you do again is is beyond On you know, w I don't know how how uh we can't again, we just can't thank you enough. You know, I could go on and on. So very, very much appreciated and and you know, I I think people need to realize too, is that especially your team members and your physicians
and your and your registered nurse, they really do this because they want to. They could go off. And make double, triple Yeah, it's not about the money. By no by no means is it. They could go off and especially in this marketplace, make two or three times the amount of money, but you guys are dedicated and your team's dedicated. So thank you.
Madam Chair. Commissioner Oakley. I can't say thank you enough for all that you and your staff did. It it was amazing the difference it was to be able to work with so closely with the health department. and work through a lot of issues we're having. Even those cases and you know Mike I'd call you on those cases for some elderly people that were having a hard time getting on
their place in line to do it. We even help communities outside of Pasco coming to Saint Leo, that service there was tremendous. The number you could do in a day was just amazing. How many you did and actually you were in in the shade all the time because it was pretty hot during some of those times, so But it worked out. It really worked out great. I was proud to be a part of Pasco County and working with you at the health department. and all your staff. Very appreciative of all that. Advent
Help stepped out in in my area with some Seniors also with some vaccine and all that. That really helped time. And those are very small numbers. You had a large numbers all the time. But those small numbers Just the gratitude and the small numbers you get from S senior citizens that couldn't get there. Just their gratitude and just that. I mean you just multiply that by many because you help so many people. So But it was a great thing that uh We stepped forward
and did what we did and I think we were uh better and I think he got a better handle on things because we did what we did at the time. So it was all uncharted ground that We found that you can do. So but Pasco County's uh The top of the list as far as I'm concerned is in the health department area. So Thank you. Uh Commissioner Mariano.
Mike, I want to say you and your team Uh the dedication, the time, uh the performance you put on was phenomenal. um from the testing right off the bat. Later on as far as getting the vaccinations done across the board, across the county. Uh the the setup you put up with the monocolonal was phenomenal. And I think that was one of the biggest positive things we've we've ever done to actually save people and and save them quickly. So I I wanna say I know it took a lot of time. I know uh I mean My daughter Lauren was actually working with the state
at the time on on DEM with Kevin Guthrie and all and she had to be working seventy five hours a week. I'm probably I think you're probably working even more. And the calls you got from all of us I'm sure just kept on going and going. And much as we all just kind of were probably peppering you for this, that, and the other thing, your performance and your whole team's performance was phenomenal. So I want to thank you for all that. Um I'd like to ask you a question too, if we could, for the future coming up. You mentioned about the opioid task force, uh what's going on. I'm glad you guys are part of that. I think it need to be a very big part of that. Um we've got a new jail
that's coming in. Um we're setting it up where we can actually deal with mental health drug disorders as well. So I want you guys to stay closely as we kind of develop what we're gonna go do to make sure we're gonna treat these treat our citizens as best we can every step of the way. Sure. So thank you. Thank you again.
And uh gosh, what a what an interesting time to be a commissioner. And I I'm just really proud of our county, our health department, just just our administration, all our partners. I thought I think we were one of the models for the state, if not the country, so I'm glad we're getting through it. Not done yet, but we're definitely getting through it. So I'm I'm actually flying on the day that the mask ordinance or rules stop for airlines, April eighteenth, I think it is. I
haven't decided yet, but I'm I'm probably gonna still wear my mask, but I I don't have to. So thank you so much. We look forward to uh your move and the next time you come visit us. Thank you. Okay. Our