COVID-19 Updates: August, 20 2020

Board of Elections encourages voters to submit absentee requests early

Orange County voters interested in Absentee Voting By Mail are encouraged to make their request well before the deadline due to anticipated high demand, said Orange County Elections Director Rachel Raper.

All by-mail civilian absentee ballot requests must be submitted on the State Absentee Ballot Request form and must be signed by the voter or a near relative who is making a request on behalf of a voter. The form is available on the Orange County website (www.orangecountync.gov/1104/Absentee-Voting-By-Mail).

Requests may be mailed (PO Box 220, Hillsborough 27278), emailed (vote@orangecountync.gov), faxed (919-644-3318) or hand delivered to the Board of Elections office (208 S Cameron Street, Hillsborough).

Requests must be received by the BoE by 5 p.m. on the Tuesday before the election (Oct. 27). Postmarks do not qualify.

Completed by-mail ballots must be returned to the Board of Elections office by 5 p.m. Election Day (Nov. 3). An extension is given for ballots postmarked by Election Day and received in the Elections office by the Friday following the Election (Nov. 6).

A by-mail absentee voter must have one witness in their presence as they complete their ballot and application envelope.

Voters who receive a mailed absentee ballot may still vote in person on Election Day or during early voting as long as the mailed absentee ballot was not returned.

Early voting in Orange County begins Oct. 15 at six locations throughout the county. More information can be found at: www.orangecountync.gov/1116/Early-Voting

The Orange County Board of Elections office will not be an early voting site for the Presidential Election. Those wishing to vote early in Hillsborough may go to Orange Works at Orange County DSS, 113 Mayo St.

Orange County will follow CDC recommendations to ensure a safe voting in-person process at all early voting sites and on Election Day, including enhanced cleaning of each location, single-use pens for voters to mark ballots and single-use cotton swabs for voters using touch-screen machines. Staff will wear masks, gloves and face shields, masks will be available for any voter who needs one, and voters will be asked to observe social distancing while waiting in line.

NCDHHS Expanding Mental Health Supports for Teachers, School Personnel and Their Families

The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) is expanding the Hope4Healers Helpline (919-226-2002) to serve North Carolina’s teachers, school personnel and their families.

With schools opening in-person and remotely across the state under new health and safety procedures, NCDHHS and the NC Psychological Foundation can provide these personnel with mental health and resilience supports through Hope4Healers. Hope4Healers is available 24 hours per day, seven days a week. When teachers, school personnel or family members call the helpline, they will speak to someone who is trained to listen and offer support. They then will be contacted within about a day by a licensed mental health professional for a free, confidential, short-term follow-up by phone or video chat.

“Our children across the state will be best served by educators and school staff who are taking care of their own mental health needs,” said NCDHHS Deputy Secretary for Behavioral Health and Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Kody Kinsley. “Our educators and school teams are working in an unprecedented situation on the front lines of the state’s COVID-19 response. We want to make sure they have access to the mental health and resilience supports they may need to feel like their best selves in the classroom – whether they are teaching in-person or remotely.”

NCDHHS launched the Hope4Healers Helpline earlier this year in partnership with the North Carolina Psychological Foundation and has served over 160 people to date. The helpline has been providing mental health and resilience counseling for first responders, health care and child care professionals, other staff who work in those settings and their families throughout the state who are experiencing stress from being on the front lines of the state’s COVID-19 response.

The Hope4Healers initiative builds on the longstanding Hope4NC Helpline (1-855-587-3463) that provides mental health and resilience supports for all North Carolinians.

Hope4Healers continues to recruit additional licensed behavioral health professional volunteers to support this line. Volunteers must register though the NC Training, Exercise and Response Management System (NC TERMS). That system can be accessed through https://terms.ncem.org/TRS.

Volunteers must follow these steps:

Create a personal profile in NC TERMS.
In NC TERMS, click ‘Join a Team’; select ‘ESF8 – Public Health and Medical Services’; then select ‘COVID 19 Medical Response Volunteers.'
From there select ‘Mental/Behavioral Health Personnel’ and click ‘Request Membership.’
Volunteers will be contacted for follow-up once their licenses have been validated.

Additional resources and information on staying physically and mentally healthy can be found on the Managing your Overall Health and Wellness Resources webpages on the NCDHHS COVID-19 website: covid19.ncdhhs.gov. You can also visit the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website at cdc.gov/coronavirus for more information

States are calling racism a public health crisis.
Here's what that means

Protesters gather in downtown Portland, Oregon, on July 25.

By Harmeet Kaur and Skylar Mitchell, CNN
With Covid-19, the US is experiencing its worst public health crisis in a generation. But that same crisis is prompting leaders to take note of another emergency, one that has been ongoing for centuries:

Racism.

Michigan and Nevada became the latest states to declare racism a public health crisis earlier this month, joining Wisconsin and local governments in California, Ohio and other states following the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

Treating racism as a public health issue isn't a new idea. A handful of local governments declared it a crisis last year, and health professionals have identified racism as a public health issue for well over a decade.

These latest declarations and resolutions, though, come as the country remains in the midst of a national reckoning on race. Both the Covid-19 pandemic and the recent killings of Black people at the hands of police have brought renewed attention to the ways that systems and institutions disadvantage people of color, especially Black Americans.

Now as communities call on their leaders to address systemic racism, more governments are considering similar declarations.

"What we're hoping will happen is that by thinking of this through a public health lens, it will help people recognize that racism actually hurts people -- it impacts their health in a negative way," Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, told CNN. "Then we're hoping that once people recognize that and they take the next step, they will begin to do things to unravel that."

Here's what it means to treat racism as a public health crisis, and why officials believe it's necessary.

Chronic health disparities persist between Black and White people in the US
While health disparities have narrowed since 1999, the latest available data from 2015 show that Black people in the US continue to face higher rates of chronic disease compared to White people.

How racism and health are tied

Black women are nearly four times as likely to die of pregnancy-related causes than White women. Black men are more than twice as likely to be killed by police as White men. Black people are more likely than White people to experience high blood pressure, diabetes and stroke. And they're more likely to die at early ages of all causes.

The Covid-19 pandemic perfectly encapsulates how racism manifests in public health.

Black and Latino Americans who get infected are more likely to have pre-existing conditions that increase their risk of severe illness, according to a report from Johns Hopkins. Because they are more likely to be uninsured, they tend to put off seeking treatment and are sicker when they do receive care. On top of that, they tend to receive less aggressive treatment than White Americans, the report states.

At home, crowded housing conditions make it harder for Black and Latino Americans to practice physical distancing, and many of them work in essential jobs that can't be performed remotely.

"Racism has been killing people for a long time, either through benign neglect, aggressive policing, gentrification, or through a healthcare system that doesn't know how to take care of people of color," Sánchez said.

The ongoing protests and national outcry over systemic racism that erupted after the death of George Floyd has put increased pressure on leaders and institutions to address racism in their communities.

The American Public Health Association, the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American College of Emergency Physicians are among the organizations calling racism a public health crisis.

Increasingly, more state and local leaders are doing the same.

Demonstrators march along the Strip in Las Vegas on May 29.

What the declarations do -- and don't -- entail

That states, counties and cities are recognizing the extent to which racism affects people's lives is an encouraging first step, public health experts said.

"They help us define that there is a problem," Benjamin said. "The first part of trying to solve a problem is to identify that it exists.

But many of the declarations are just that -- statements that name the issue and pledge to do better but stop short of outlining a clear plan of action or allocating funds for the problem.

"Ultimately what does it mean?" asked Sánchez. "Is the state going to figure out how to put more resources into the public health infrastructure that deals with the social determinants of health? Are they going to stratify data on where people are and how they're doing and how sick they are and target them with public health messages?"

Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, called racism a public health crisis at a news conference in June, though the state has not issued a formal declaration.

"Just like we cannot look away from police brutality and the killing of Black men and Black women, we cannot look away from the reality that inaction, indifference and institutional racism has harmed generations of Black and brown Wisconsinites," Evers said in June.

At that same news conference, Evers rattled off statistics highlighting the disparities between the state's Black and White residents. He also called on the state legislature to pass a bill that would limit police use of force.

Nevada's declaration came on August 5 in the form of a proclamation issued by Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak. The proclamation offered few specifics, though the governor's office said it builds on work that is already being done by the state's Office of Minority Health and Equity.

"Given Nevada's diverse population as a minority, majority state, this call to action raises awareness so Nevada does not perpetuate poor health outcomes due to systemic racism during and after the pandemic," Sisolak's office said in a news release.

Michigan went further.

Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed an executive order on August 5 directing the state's health department and other state agencies to collect and analyze data on health outcomes by race, develop plans to tackle racial inequities and engage communities in developing solutions to the problem. It also requires state employees to complete implicit bias training on a biannual basis.

Whitmer, a first-term governor, also created an advisory council made up of Black leaders to address issues affecting the state's Black residents.

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer declares racism a public health crisis in the state on Aug. 5.

What these places can learn from Milwaukee

For an example of how to move forward after issuing a declaration, leaders might look to Milwaukee County, Wisconsin.

The county became one of the first local governments to declare racism a public health crisis in April 2019. About a month later, the county passed a resolution pledging to address racial disparities.

Then in late April of this year, leaders passed an ordinance that outlined a framework for improving health outcomes in the community and addressing biases in its government.

The ordinance commits Milwaukee County to ensuring that its leaders reflect its population and evaluating what services it offers and how it spends its budget, among other objectives.

Since then, David Crowley, who was recently sworn in as county executive, said that Milwaukee County has been taking a "deep dive" into the disparities it is perpetuating through its policies, procedures and internal hiring processes.

"For at least the past decade, we've been at the top of many of the worst lists," Crowley told CNN. "... If we want to get off that list, we're going to have to take a hard look at ourselves and take the proper steps to do so."

Crowley said that since last year's declaration, thousands of county employees have undergone racial equity trainings that cover microagressions, implicit biases and other issues. The county has also created a "racial budgeting tool" that will allow it to assess the impact that budget cuts and investments have on communities of color.

Though the coronavirus pandemic has stalled the county's efforts, Crowley said that the declaration and ordinance have put the county on a path to ensuring racial equity.

Marchers head down a Milwaukee street during a protest march against the killing of George Floyd.

What needs to happen next

The growing list of states and localities that are recognizing racism as a public health crisis signals that more people are coming to understand the myriad ways that race shapes a person's outcomes, Benjamin said.

But the true test, he said, will be whether elected officials "walk the talk, not just pass the resolution." And that entails making sure that governments have the data they need to understand disparities and that they think about the impact that the existing and proposed laws will have on their communities.

"It's going to require proactive action," Benjamin said. "... You actually have to ask for change, and that means you have to measure what you're doing. You have to get the data and look at the impact and understand why you have that impact."

The hope among public health experts now is that the momentum of the racial justice movement continues.

"Our hope is that it doesn't stop, and that this current crop of elected officials don't just let it lay there," Benjamin said.

Because while recognizing the problem is key, what ultimately will make a difference in the lives of people is what leaders do about it.

North Carolina COVID-19 Cases

The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) reports 149,904 COVID-19 cases, 2,465 deaths, and 1,023 hospitalizations, as of August 20, 2020. For more information regarding live updates (NCDHHS updates the site every day at noon), please visit the NCDHHS website.

Orange County Health Department also has a COVID-19 dashboard webpage, with information on COVID-19 data in the county. The dashboard will be updated every Tuesday and Thursday.

There are currently 1,650 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Orange County, and 49 deaths.

COVID-19 Community Resources

For more information on COVID-19 community resources in the county, please visit our webpage. Resources on specific topic areas, such as food access, education, housing, and others, are all accessible on our website, or at the links below.

Contact Information

For general questions (not urgent) about 2019 Novel Coronavirus, contact NCDHHS at: ncresponse@dhhs.nc.gov or 1-866-462-3821 to address general questions about coronavirus from the public.

If you are an individual or a medical practice with questions about COVID-19, call the Orange County Health Department at (919) 245-6111. During business hours (8:30a.m. to 5 p.m.)

Contact Kristin Prelipp, the Orange County Health Department’s Public Information Officer at: kprelipp@orangecountync.gov or 919-245-2462

Orange County Health Department:
Web: www.orangecountync.gov/coronavirus
Phone: 919-245-2400
Email: covid19@orangecountync.gov
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