Health department offering free at-home test kits
COVID-19 may not be a thing of the past just yet, but Gilmer County is now in a good place as far as its number of cases, or at least those that are being reported.
Dr. Zachary Taylor, director of the North Georgia Health District, gave that update last Tuesday during the Gilmer County Board of Health’s first in-person meeting in over two years. The board had been holding quarterly teleconferences since mid-2020.
According to the Georgia Department of Public Health’s daily COVID cases updates, there were 23 cases reported in Gilmer County over the two weeks that preceded June 15.
Taylor said Georgia, as a whole, is seeing a slight increase in recent COVID cases and hospitalizations.
“This is due to a spread of a subvariant of Omicron that caused a surge in the northeast. How big it’s going to be, I don’t know. Nobody knows,” he added. “Our advice stays the same. Please get vaccinated if you’re eligible. If you’re concerned about contracting the virus, wear a good quality mask when you’re out in public.”
One reason the number of reported COVID cases may not be higher here is that many people are no longer getting tested at facilities like the health department, Taylor noted.
The Gilmer Health Department no longer does in-person COVID testing, although testing for court, school system and first responder employees is still offered there. A MAKO medical test site that offered in-person testing at the Civic Center parking lot closed in May.
With that testing option ending, the Gilmer Health Department is now offering free at-home COVID test kits.
Krystal Sumner, nurse manager, noted the health department gave out more than 100 of the Binax Now test kits in the past three weeks.
“We’re offering them to all our patients. If anyone walks in and requests one, we’ll give it to them,“ Taylor said.
The health department is still offering COVID vaccinations each day it’s open, and an appointment isn’t needed to get the shots, Sumner noted.
“We provide Moderna, Pfizer and Johnson and Johnson. Primary and booster doses are given to those who are eligible,” she added.
In other news ...
Board of Health members Charlie Paris, Lex Rainey, Curtis Kingsley, Dr. Brian Ridley and Tracy Wells approved a $1.2 million operating budget for the Gilmer Health Department’s upcoming fiscal year, which begins July 1.
During her report to board members, Sumner said health department personnel recently screened 462 Clear Creek Middle School students for scoliosis and provided meningitis, Tdap and HPV vaccinations to students at a first-time onsite immunization clinic at Mountain Education Charter High School.
Sumner said the health department is again a host site for the Seamless Summer nutrition program, which is now underway. The health department site has been providing approximately 40 children a day with lunch and snacks, she added.