Orange County Health Department

Emergency Preparedness and Response:
January 13, 2021

If you are 75 years of age or older, you are now eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. How do I get the shot? Please fill out a Vaccine Interest Form: redcap.link/OCHDvax or call 919-913-8088

The Orange County Health Department has more than 4,200 people signed up for vaccination in Phase 1b Group 1 for individuals 75 and older since registration opened on January 7.
 
The Department has vaccinated more than 1,000 community members. Most of the vaccinations were administered to those eligible in Phase 1a, including health care workers and staff caring for and working directly with COVID-19 patients. 
 
The county began vaccinations for Phase 1b Group 1 Thursday. There is no requirement to have qualifying chronic conditions to be eligible in this group for ages 75 and older.
 

Registration
No identification is needed to sign up for a vaccine. It is faster to sign up if you have an email address, but sign-up can also be completed by calling 919-913-8088. After you have filled out the vaccine interest form, you will receive an email in about 24 to 48 hours from the COVID-19 Vaccine Management System. If registering by phone, someone will assist you with all the required steps.
 
Follow this three-step process to make an appointment with the Health Department:


  1. Complete the Vaccine Interest Form (VIF) at https://redcap.link/OCHDvax ? Call 919-913-8088 if you don’t have access to a computer or would like help filling out the form. Foreign language interpreters are available. The department is receiving a high call volume. Please be patient for a return call if you decide to leave a voicemail.
  2. Register for the vaccine ? You will receive an email in 24 to 48 hours with a link to an online registration form to enter your data into the COVID-19 Vaccine Management System (CVMS). This will take several minutes to complete. The form is only available in English, but county staff are available at 919-913-8088 to help register people in other languages.
  3. Schedule your vaccine appointment ? When you are eligible to receive a vaccine, you will receive another email from the Health Department to schedule an appointment. Only an appointment for the first of the two vaccine doses can be scheduled at this time.
 
UNC Health has opened registration for its local points of dispensation: https://vaccine.unchealthcare.org/get-vaccinated/
 
No one from Orange County or the state will ask for payment on the phone. The vaccine is free, even if you don’t have insurance. If you do have insurance, please bring your information with you to the appointment.
 
Points of Vaccination
The locations for the Health Department’s points of vaccination (also called Points of Dispensing, or a POD) will change from week to week and day to day. UNC Health also has points of vaccination at its Chapel Hill and Hillsborough campuses.
 
North Carolinians can get the vaccine outside their home county, but they are encouraged to check with their local health department first. The state has prioritized access points for the vaccine in every county.
 
Appointments
Residents must make an appointment for vaccination. Appointments are required to better manage crowds and to better track the department’s available supply of vaccine. Anyone without an appointment will be turned away from a point of vaccination with directions on how to sign up.
 
The number of appointments per day will depend on the number of doses the department receives from the state. This can vary between 100 and 300 appointments per day at this time and may be even smaller for the targeted vaccination events the Health Department will have for Phase 1b Group 1.
 
The Health Department is not yet making appointments for the second dose vaccinations. When community members get their first shot, they are given a card with their vaccine information. Later, they will receive another email from the Health Department to make the appointment for their second shot.
 
Vaccine effectiveness
The vaccine takes 10 to 14 days to become effective. The first dose provides some protection 10 to 14 days after it has been received. A second shot (called the booster) is needed to achieve 95% effectiveness against COVID-19, with protection reached 10 to 14 days after the booster is received.
 
Anyone who is vaccinated still needs to wear a mask, wait 6 feet apart from others and wash their hands often. The county’s COVID-19 numbers are high. See this week’s data: https://www.orangecountync.gov/DocumentCenter/View/14360/weekly_update_press_release_january_8_2021
 
Related documents
  • Orange County Health Department’s COVID-19 Vaccine page
  • UNC Health’s Vaccine Hub
  • The NCDHHS Vaccine Page
  • Orange County Health Department’s Vaccine Interest Survey



COVID-19 Testing Events


For the most up-to-date information on testing please visit: orangecountync.gov/testing. 

Daily testing will continue Monday through Saturday from 9 am to 6 pm in Chapel Hill at the R7 parking lot at 725 MLK Blvd., Chapel Hill, NC 27514.
Pre-registration is encouraged: https://lhi.care/covidtesting

Daily testing will continue Monday through Friday from 9 am to 5 pm in Hillsborough at the Whitted Human Services Building at 300 W. Tryon St. Hillsborough, NC 27278.
Pre-registration is encouraged: https://unityphm.com/campaigns/starmed. 

Piedmont Health is offering COVID-19 testing events for adults age 60+:

Friday, January 15, 10am - 1pm
Seymour Center
2551 Homestead Rd
Chapel Hill, NC 27516

Friday, January 22, 10am - 1pm
Passmore Center
103 Meadowlands Dr
Hillsborough, NC 27278

Receive test results within 3-5 business days. Testing is available with or without insurance at no cost. 
Pre-registration is encouraged. Walk-ups welcome. Call M-F 8-5 or Sat 8-1 to register and receive an appointment time: (919) 545-3452.

You may find other Orange County testing sites, not associated with the Orange County Health Department, at this link:

https://www.orangecountync.gov/DocumentCenter/View/11576/Coronavirus-Testing-Chart-PDF
 
For other testing location in North Carolina, use this link: 
https://covid19.ncdhhs.gov/about-covid-19/testing/find-my-testing-place


COVID-19 Vaccine FAQ:

Is the vaccine safe if I am pregnant?

CDC says:

Pregnant people with COVID-19 are at greater risk for severe illness. Additionally, they might be at an increased risk of adverse pregnancy outcomes, such as preterm birth.

We don't have a lot of data on the safety of COVID-19 vaccines in pregnant people. We have some data from animal studies. No safety concerns were demonstrated in rats that received Moderna COVID-19 vaccine prior to or during gestation in terms of female reproduction, fetal/embryonal development, or postnatal development. Studies in pregnant people are planned and the vaccine manufacturers are following outcomes in people in the clinical trials who became pregnant. Based on current knowledge, experts believe that mRNA vaccines are unlikely to pose a risk to the pregnant person or the fetus because mRNA vaccines are not live vaccines. The mRNA in the vaccine is degraded quickly by normal cellular processes and does not enter the nucleus of the cell. However, the potential risks of mRNA vaccines to the pregnant person and the fetus are unknown because these vaccines have not been studied in pregnant people.

Pregnant people may choose to be vaccinated. A conversation between the patient and their clinical team may assist them in making a decision, though a conversation with a healthcare provider is not required before vaccination. When making a decision, pregnant people and their healthcare providers should consider the level of COVID-19 community transmission, the patient’s personal risk of contracting COVID-19, the risks of COVID-19 to the patient and potential risks to the fetus, the efficacy of the vaccine, the side effects of the vaccine, and the lack of data about the vaccine during pregnancy.

Side effects can occur with COVID-19 vaccine use in pregnant people, similar to those expected among non-pregnant people. Pregnant people who experience fever following vaccination may be counseled to take acetaminophen as fever has been associated with adverse pregnancy outcomes. Acetaminophen may be offered as an option for pregnant people experiencing other post-vaccination symptoms as well.

Those who are trying to become pregnant do not need to avoid pregnancy after mRNA COVID-19 vaccination.

North Carolina's COVID-19 Vaccine Management System (CVMS) Provider Enrollment Portal is Open


Enrollment can be initiated here:?https://covid-enroll.ncdhhs.gov/s/login/?ec=302&startURL=%2Fs%2F.?Any provider enrolling through the portal will be reviewed and considered for approval by the NC Immunization Branch to administer the COVID-19 vaccine.
?? 
As a reminder, COVID-19?vaccine providers must be qualified under the CDC agreement to prescribe COVID-19?vaccines?and authorized under?the appropriate?NC licensing authority.?Enrolled COVID-19 vaccine providers must be credentialed/licensed in North Carolina.?Please understand that?while?currently qualified providers are welcome to enroll, requests?will be addressed in an order aligned with the prioritization phases and the timeline for approval will vary.?The State will continuously reassess enrollment prioritization based on needs. 
??  
Please visit the North Carolina Immunization Branch COVID-19 training website for Provider Enrollment Portal training content:?https://immunize.nc.gov/providers/covid-19training.htm. 

Additional trainings?related to?CVMS?can also be found on?https://immunize.nc.gov/providers/covid-19training.htm. Please note, any trainings you?elect to?review?at this time?are subject to?be?refreshed?by the time you?become an approved provider. You may need to revisit trainings depending on approval timelines.



National Radon Action Month

Protect your family from radon. Radon is a gas that you can't see smell, or taste - but it can be dangerous. It's the second leading cause of lung cancer in the U.S. 1 out of 15 homes have high radon levels. Learn more by calling the National Radon Hotline: 1-800-SOS-RADON (1-800-767-7236)

Radon is a colorless, odorless, tasteless, and chemically inert radioactive gas. It is formed by the natural radioactive decay of uranium in rock, soil, and water. It can be found in all 50 states. Testing for it is the only way of telling how much radon is present.

The NC Radon Program received funds from the U.S. EPA to give away 3,000 short-term radon test kits beginning in January 2021 - one test kit per household.  Click here to order one free radon test kit.

When this supply of free kits have been exhausted, you may order a test kit at www.sosradon.org  


Hospital Bills For Uninsured COVID-19 Patients Are Covered, But No One Tells Them


By Blake Farmer
Published Oct. 22, 2020
NPR

When Darius Settles died from COVID-19 on the Fourth of July, his family and the city of Nashville, Tenn., were shocked. Even the mayor noted the passing of a 30-year-old without any underlying conditions — one of the city's youngest fatalities at that point.

Settles was also uninsured and had just been sent home from an emergency room for the second time, and he was worried about medical bills. An investigation into his death found that, like many uninsured COVID-19 patients, he had never been told that cost shouldn't be a concern.

Back at the end of June, Settles and his wife, Angela, were both feeling ill with fevers and body aches. Then Darius took a turn — bad enough that he asked his wife to call an ambulance.

"My husband is having issues breathing and he's weak, so we're probably going to need a paramedic over here to rush him to the hospital," she told the operator, according to the 911 recordings obtained by WPLN News.

Darius Settles was stabilized and tested for the coronavirus at the hospital, according to his medical records. The doctor sent him home with antibiotics and instructions to come back if things got worse.

Three days later, they did. And now he also knew he had COVID-19; his test results were in.

But Settles was also between full-time jobs, playing the organ at a church as he launched a career as a suit designer. So he had no health insurance.

His wife, who works for Tennessee State University, says he was worried about costs as he went back to the hospital a second time; she tried to reassure him.

"He said, 'I bet this hospital bill is going to be high.' And I said, 'Babe, it's going to be OK.' And we left it alone, just like that," she says.

When he returned to TriStar Southern Hills Medical Center, owned by the for-profit hospital chain HCA, physicians tested his blood oxygen levels, which are usually a first sign that a COVID-19 patient is in trouble. They had dropped to 88%. An X-ray of his lungs "appears worse," the physician wrote in the record.

But the doctor also noted that his oxygen saturations improved, and he was breathing on room air after a few hours in the emergency room. The records show they discussed why he might not want to be admitted to the hospital since he was otherwise young and healthy and didn't note any risk factors for complications.

And when Angela Settles called to check in, he seemed to be OK with leaving despite his persistent struggle to breathe.

He was a COVID-19 patient so, "I could not go up there to see him," she says. "He was saying that I might as well go home."

Angela Settles was surprised since her husband was the one who wanted to go to the hospital in the first place.

At first, she thought the hospital just didn't want to admit a man without insurance who would have trouble paying a big bill. But TriStar Southern Hills admits hundreds of patients a year without insurance — more than 500 in 2019, according to a spokesperson.

And in this case, the federal government would have paid the bill. But no one said that when it might have made a difference to Darius Settles.

Message never makes it to patients

TriStar, like most major health systems, participates in a program through the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in which uninsured patients with COVID-19 have their bills covered. It was set up through the pandemic relief legislation known as the CARES Act.

But TriStar doesn't tell its patients that upfront. Neither do other hospitals or national health systems contacted by WPLN News. There's no requirement to, which is one of the program's shortcomings, says Jennifer Tolbert of the Kaiser Family Foundation who studies uninsured patients. (KHN is an editorially independent program of the foundation.)

"This is obviously a great concern to most uninsured patients," Tolbert says. Her research finds that people without insurance often avoid care because of the bill or the threat of the bill, even though they might qualify for any number of programs if they asked enough questions.

Tolbert says the problem with the COVID-19 uninsured program is that even doctors don't always know how it works or that the program exists.

"At the point when the patient shows up at the hospital or at another provider site, it's at that point when those questions need to be answered," she says. "And it's not always clear that that is happening."

Among clinicians, there's a reluctance to raise the issue of cost in any way and run afoul of federal laws. Emergency rooms must at least stabilize everyone, regardless of their ability to pay, under a federal law known as the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, or EMTALA. Asking questions about insurance coverage is often referred to as a "wallet biopsy," and can result in fines for hospitals or even being temporarily banned from receiving Medicare payments.

Physicians also don't want to make a guarantee, knowing a patient still could end up having to fight a bill.

"I don't want to absolutely promise anything," says Ryan Stanton, an ER physician in Lexington, Ky., and a board member of the American College of Emergency Physicians.
"There should not be a false sense that it will be an absolute smooth path when we're dealing with government services and complexities of the health care system," he says.

"Could I have done more?"

Darius Settles knew he was in bad shape. But he didn't attempt to make a third trip to the hospital. Instead of 911, he called his father, pastor David Settles, and asked his father to come pray for him.

When the elder Settles replied that he was always praying for his son, Darius said, "No, I really need you to pray for me. I need you to get the oil, lay hands on me and pray," David Settles recalls, and so he went, despite concern for getting COVID-19 himself.

He sat by his son's side. Darius' wife made some peppermint tea, and when they put it to his lips, Darius didn't sip. They thought he had fallen asleep. But he was unconscious.
At that point, they called 911 again and the operator instructed them to get Darius to the floor and perform chest compressions until paramedics arrived.

For 11 minutes, Angela Settles pumped her husband's chest, occasionally asking the dispatcher "what's taking so long," the 911 recordings show. Even after help showed up, Darius never revived.

Pastor Settles was back in the pulpit just a few weeks later, preaching on suffering and grief after the death of his son, "whom I watched as the breath left his body," he told his congregation. "The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away."

Darius Settles left behind his own son, who was 6. And his widow's head is still spinning. She says she can't shake a sense of personal guilt.

"Could I have done more?" Angela Settles asks. "That's hard, and I know that he would not want me to feel like that."

She wonders, too, if the hospital could have done more for him. And even after failing to disclose its policy for uninsured COVID-19 patients, it did send her a bill for part of her husband's care. Asked why, a TriStar spokesperson says it was sent in error and does not have to be paid.

This story is from a reporting partnership that includes WPLN, NPR and KHN.



Apply Online for Help with Energy Costs


https://www.ncdhhs.gov/news/press-releases/north-carolinians-can-apply-online-help-energy-costs-beginning-monday
 
North Carolinians Can Apply Online for Help with Energy Costs Beginning Monday, January 4th. Households can apply online at: https://epass.nc.gov
 
Applying for these programs online is easy and convenient, as well as safe and helps people socially distance. Applicants can also call their county department of social services to apply by phone or print a paper application from www.epass.nc.gov to mail, fax or drop off at their county department of social services. 


North Carolina COVID-19 Cases


The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) reports 641,073 COVID-19 cases, 7,745 deaths, and 3,951 hospitalizations as of January 13, 2021. 190,195 people have received their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, and 28,978 have completed their series as of January 11, 2021. 

There are currently 5,839 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 68 deaths in Orange County as of January 6, 2021. 6,168 people have received their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, and 1,195 have completed their vaccine series, as of January 11, 2021.

For more information regarding live updates (NCDHHS updates the site every day around 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.




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.
Stay at Home
Community Resources
Multilingual Resources
Face Coverings
Social Distancing
COVID-19 FAQ
Testing
Symptoms
Myths and Facts
How to Help
Long Term Facilities
Equity
Places of Worship
Pets
OCHD Spanish Webpage




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
Facebook: Orange County Health Department
Instagram: OrangeHealthNC
Twitter: Orange Health NC
Youtube: OCHDNC

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300 W Tryon St, Hillsborough, NC 27278

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