January 27, 2003, Board of Health Minutes, Calhoun County, Michigan (MI)

Board of Health Minutes

CALHOUN COUNTY BOARD OF HEALTH
MEETING MINUTES
DATE: January 27, 2003
Battle Creek, Michigan

PRESENT:

Board of Health	Larry Anderson, Chairperson
	Jean Cook-Hughes, Vice Chairperson
	Ben Miller, County Commissioner
	Jeffrey R. Mitchell (incumbent Board member)
	George Perrett
Health Department	Heidi Oberlin, Health Officer
	Ted Havens, Environmental Health Director
	Paul Makoski, Environmental Health
	Kathy Ferguson, Finance Officer
	Dianna Morand, Administrative Assistant
	Dr. Greg Harrington, Medical Officer
Calhoun County	Greg Purcell, County Administrator
	Nancy Mullett, Legal Counsel
	Brad Wilcox, Administrative Services Director

Larry Anderson called the meeting to order at 8:35 a.m. in the Health Department Conference Room, George W. Toeller Building, 190 E. Michigan Avenue, Battle Creek, Michigan.

The acceptance of the resignation of Charles Seifert from the Board of Health was added to the Agenda. George Perrett moved to approve the Agenda. It was seconded by Larry Anderson and approved unanimously.

Larry Anderson reviewed the decisions which had occurred at the Board of Health Retreat for the benefit of those who had not been present. He said that a mission statement was adapted. He also said that three areas of strategic focus were addressed for the next three years:

Adapt a board governance model and revise the by-laws;
Mission driven outcomes;
Financial accountability.

Larry indicated that at the February meeting, Art Cole, who was the facilitator for the Retreat, will summarize for the full Board the processes of the Retreat and the outcomes so the Board can move forward with everyone having a full understanding.

Larry also stated that it is important that the members inform Dee regarding attendance at the meetings so that it will be known if there will be a quorum. He also stated that a high degree of civility would be expected at all meetings. He further added that it has been decided that the Health Officer is empowered as a Chief Executive Officer which will require revisions of her position description. He said that communication with the Department should be through the CEO rather than Health Department staff.

PUBLIC COMMENT - none.

MEDICAL REPORT - none

CONSENT AGENDA

Moved by George Perrett and seconded by Ben Miller. It was approved unanimously.

RESOLUTIONS:

Res. 01-2003 Approve the Agreement with Evaluation and Measurement Specialties for the period December 1, 2002 through March 31, 2003.

Heidi indicated that Resolutions 1 and 2 are linked; they are both budgeted and part of the program plan for prevention of teen pregnancy. MSU Extension will conduct focus groups and Evaluation and Measurement Specialties will put the data together.

Moved by George Perrett, seconded by Ben Miller, and approved unanimously.

Res. 02-2003 Approve the Agreement with Michigan State University Extension Services for the period January 1, 2003 through December 31, 2003.

Moved by Ben Miller and seconded by George Perrett. Approved unanimously.

Res. 03-2003 Approve the recommendation of Environmental Health regarding Health Department handling of the West Nile Virus situation.

Ted Havens indicated that based on the budget of the Health Department and information on West Nile at this time, a proactive educational program and providing of mosquito briquettes would be in the best interest of the county residents.

Moved by George Perrett, seconded by Ben Miller, and approved unanimously.

Res. 04-2003 Approve the Grant Agreement with the March of Dimes for Fetal Infant Mortality Review for the period January 1, 2003 through December 31, 2003.

Heidi indicated that Fetal Infant Mortality Review is an ongoing process. She said that Calhoun County gets a lot of attention in this because of the disparity between the African-American and White infant mortality rate. Calhoun County is also above the State average on a fairly regular basis.

She explained that what this review process does is look into the whys and wherefores. It is a process that needs to be continued. She said that the findings so far indicate that two of the areas of concern in Calhoun County are in the fact that unhealthy women are getting pregnant and after babies go home, they are dying.

Moved by George Perrett, seconded by Ben Miller, and approved unanimously.

(Additional to the Agenda)

Res. 05-2003 Approve the Lease for the Health Department with Calhoun County for the space in the Toeller Bldg.

Moved by George Perrett, seconded by Ben Miller, and approved unanimously.

It was suggested by Jean Cook-Hughes that maybe the Board needs to look at changing the time of the meetings since we seem to be having such a difficult time maintaining a quorum at the regularly scheduled meetings.

It was moved by George Perrett that information regarding a different time be looked at again.

FINANCE REPORT

Kathy Ferguson said that she has some concerns because fees for immunizations were a lot less than what was hoped for and the situation with State funding is not good at this time. She said that $90,000 would be lost this year and it could be more.

Nancy Mullett expressed concerns over the fact that the Department does not have contracts with the schools. Heidi said that contracts have been sent out but the schools just send back checks rather than following up on getting the contracts signed.

Nancy also asked if the Chair and Vice-Chair were chosen at the December meeting. She was told that Larry Anderson is still Chair and Jean Cook-Hughes is now the Vice-Chair.

OTHER BUSINESS

Presentation by EH

Since there was not a quorum present at 8:00 a.m., Ted Havens and Paul Makoski shared some information with the Board concerning West Nile Disease in Michigan. Paul did the presentation on West Nile Disease to give some background.

Paul said that Oregon, Utah, Arizona and Hawaii are the only states at this time that do not have West Nile Virus. It is anticipated that in 2003, Oregon, Utah and Arizona will have the problem also. Basically all species of birds seem to be carriers and the spread of the virus seems to be following the bird flyways.

He said that, although other animals have been infected by the disease, primarily people, birds, and horses are most likely to be infected. He said that Illinois is the number one state for the West Nile Virus in human cases and fatalities and Michigan is number two.

He gave information on the mosquitos that are the known carriers of West Nile Disease. One of the problems is that the group known to be the carriers actually over-winter so they lay their eggs in early spring. One female has 20-30,000 offsprings in a season. So if the female is infected, there are a lot of opportunities for the virus to be spread. They are known as house mosquitoes because they do not fly very far from homes and back yards. They also like polluted water. Because of all of this, the time to begin preventative measures is not in June or July but in early Spring before the mosquitoes have a chance to lay their eggs.

He said that what has happened, is that this virus is coming into a population that has no resistance. The mosquito will bite one bird and then another and then another - so one mosquito can infect many birds. Then of course some of the mosquitoes are biting humans. Some people are bitten and have little or no reaction, others get quite ill without ever knowing they had West Nile disease, and some people die. After a person has survived the virus, he/she has an immunity to the disease. He said that last year, there were 3,873 cases and 246 deaths. As of January 15, there were 3,949 cases and 254 deaths in the U.S. In Michigan, as of January 15, the total was 565 cases and 47 deaths. He said that this means that even in the wintertime, when people think that nothing is happening, there was an increase in cases and deaths.

Paul further explained that although, generally it is expected that something like West Nile effects the very young and the very old. He said that in the situation, however, the young did not have any problem. The average age of people getting the disease was 58.3. The average age of fatality was 75. The youngest person to have gotten it was 9 months old. The maximum age was 95 years. The youngest person to die was 38 years old. 42% were female; 57% were males. If you are over 50, you are at highest risk. Now humans can pass it to other humans through blood transfusions, organ transplants, and pregnancy.

Storm sewers are a favorite breeding ground for these mosquitoes. Polluted ground pools, cess-pools, and sewage treatment plants, as well as tin cans, tires, even pop bottle lids can be areas for the mosquitoes to lay their eggs. This makes mosquito control a very difficult matter. Paul said that last year was actually a dry year; if we have a wet spring this year, who knows what we will be looking at? He said that eventually, due to people developing an immunization to the virus, the pool of susceptible people will shrink. However, we are not even close to that at this time.

Paul said that the recommendations of EH are as follows:

Public education regarding intervention (destruction of the breeding places) and personal protection (repellents)
The sale of mosquito briquettes for pooled water

He said that there would be a need for staff, possibly a need for some equipment, and the initial cost for the briquettes, although the sales of the briquettes would actually bring in money.

Nominating Committee Report

Larry Anderson presented Dr. Mitchell as the candidate for the Board position which was left vacant upon Dr. Seifert’s resignation. George Perrett moved approval for Dr. Mitchell to be presented to the Board of Commissioners as the new Board of Health member. Jean Cook-Hughes seconded this and it was approved unanimously.

Larry Anderson explained that the reason that the Board moved so quickly on replacing Dr. Seifert with a new member was so that he was able to benefit from the Board of Health Retreat.

The meeting was adjourned at 9:00 a.m.