Minutes 04-14-2022-Work Session - Laserfiche WebLink

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11 Commissioner Bedford thanked Vibeke Talley for serving on the Advisory Board of Aging as well. Vibeke Talley said it has been nice to collaborate and work closely together. She said they also work with the adult care board. She said they have the meetings back-to-back, and they touch base. Commissioner Bedford asked if there was a date for training to begin for new CAC members. Autumn Cox said that the state is waiting for a trainer to be hired. She said that CAC members now need increased number of hours before they can be appointed. She said they have a lot of people who are waiting to take training and they are trying to prepare them so they can get trained quickly and start making visits. Bruce Baldwin and Quintana Stewart presented for the Board of Health. Bruce Baldwin praised the Orange County Public Health Department. He said Orange County was a model for managing a pandemic. He reviewed the makeup of the Board of Health and the rules for serving. He said they meet monthly. He read the general statutes governing the Board of Health. He said almost everything people do is affected by their health and well- being. He said every monthly board meeting has three or four educational presentations. He said some presentations are required by the state of North Carolina as part of the re- accreditation process, and that Orange County will be going through that process soon. He said the new mobile dental clinic is parked at Southern Human Services and sees patients two days a week. He said the plan is for it to be driven around the county when they hire a new dentist. He said Environmental Health remained open for business during the pandemic and added services related to COVID-19. He said the health department was a pilot for an electronic death certificate process. He said the deputy registrar provided over one hundred affidavits of parentage due to state office closures. He said the health staff offered smoking cessation classes to seventy-eight people and provided 261 nicotine replacement therapy kits. He said employees provided well-child checks and family planning appointments through telehealth. He said the health department provided routine immunizations through drive through events. He said there are three permanent subcommittees of the Board of Health. He said the three subcommittees are related to the priorities identified through the community health assessment survey. He said the subcommittees were suspended for a year and a half due to the pandemic but are meeting once again. He said the Health Equity subcommittee has been recently reviewing the need for municipal sewer service in the Gaines Chapel neighborhood. He said they held a forum in a church parking lot recently to provide education and resources to residents. He said the Substance Use Disorder subcommittee is planning to support the work of the opioid task force. He said the Access to Care subcommittee is meeting soon for the first time in a while, and they will be developing a work plan for the next two years. Chair Price said the work on opioids is ongoing. She asked about smoking cessation. She asked if there are any activities for vaping and young people. Bruce Baldwin said just prior to the pandemic they discussed the vaping issue. He said since the pandemic started, vaping has not been discussed. He said they will be discussing it again soon and likely discussing the use of vapes in public spaces. Quintana Stewart said the tobacco coordinator continues to work with the schools to address vaping issues. She said they had discussed similar rules to the tobacco use in public, but they have not proceeded because tobacco could have a $20 fine and there are no exceptions for vaping and that would lead to violators getting a criminal charge. Chair Price said she was thinking of vaping restrictions for the young people and that she is not seeking to criminalize it. Bruce Baldwin said that the state has discussed vaping being a misdemeanor and they are focusing on education rather than criminalization.