The Logan County Health District has released its 2016 annual report, which includes updates and statistics from the environmental health, nursing and vital statistics divisions, and it also invites the public to examine the “behind-the-scenes” role the agency plays in keeping the community safe and healthy.
2016 VITAL RECORDS
Birth Certificates Issued 1,751 • Births Recorded 366 • Hospital Births 348 • Home Births 18 • Females 162 • Males 204 • Sets of Twins 5 • Death Certificates Issued 1,394 • Deaths Recorded 369 • Females 182 • Males 187 • Age 100+ 3 • Oldest 102 • Youngest 19 days
Logan County Health Commissioner Dr. Boyd Hoddinott offers a brief history of public health and its impacts today in a letter featured in the (download) report.
He noted that in 1854, London area physician John Snow removed a handle from a Broad Street pump in the city and effectively stopped the cholera epidemic that was killing 12 percent of the citizens who were obtaining drinking water from the well.
“This success in London inspired fundamental changes in the water and waste systems of London and eventually of most of the world,” Dr. Hoddinott said. “Still today, your health district tests the water of private and public water systems, monitors large public water systems, orders boil water alerts and seeks remediation of any sewage nuisance.”
In addition to these duties, he related that public health agencies like the local health district are responsible for inspecting restaurants and food facilities, monitoring public pools, investigating and controlling infectious disease outbreaks, reviewing child deaths, tracking possible rabies bites, performing school safety inspections and promoting healthy lifestyles.
Carrying out childhood and adult immunizations are yet another important role of public health agencies, Dr. Hoddinott said.
“Since 1796 when Edward Jenner proved that vaccination with cowpox could prevent the disease smallpox, and thus saved half a million lives yearly in Europe alone, immunization has been a mainstay of preventing many diseases.
“From polio, to tetanus, to pneumonia, flu, hepatitis and dozens of other diseases, immunization programs have done more to improve the health of the population than any medical treatment advance.”
If not for the behind-the-scenes work of local public health employees and proactive procedures during 2016, area schools and industries might have been forced to close temporarily during flu and noro gastroenteritis outbreaks, waterborne diseases the cryptosporidium outbreak could have been a bigger issue, and residents might have experienced any number of drinking water illnesses. The whole county also might have shut down from a Norwegian scabies epidemic that affected a few residents, the health commissioner noted.
Read complete story in Saturday’s Examiner.
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