Board of Health: March 24, 2021

Transcript machine-generated with Whisper speech recognition (the source video has no caption track). No speaker labels; proper names and dollar figures occasionally misheard. Click any timecode to jump to that moment in the source video.

0:01 All the meeting to order. Good evening, everybody. Good evening. A lot to do tonight, but we’re going to start with our weekly or at this point bi-weekly COVID update. So let’s start with that. Sounds good. So for March 19th, we had a total of 1,213 total cases. So we had a slight uptick in average daily incident rate and percent positive went up slightly. So, you know, people need to remember that we’re still seeing cases. They still need to follow the advisories. You still need to be wearing masks, both at all times during and public and buildings and outside. I know it’s hard. You just need to remember, you know, social distancing, mask wearing, especially if you’re with people outside your family. We will continue to see cases. There are variant cases around. So please be vigilant about your mask wearing, your social distancing, your hand washing, making sure that you’re staying home if you’re sick, get tested. It’s super easy to get tested these days. So please just remember to continue with all those things. We will continue to put out the case report on a weekly basis. And there’s a lot of information regarding new phase that we’re in, travel orders and stuff like that. So I just want to remind everybody that we put a lot of information into this, trying to, you know, put everything together and make it easy for people to find this information.

1:35 We are working with the state to vaccinate homebound individuals. So we will put some information. We are working with Marblehead Counseling on Aging, Elder Services and other nursing associations that do home visits. If you know somebody that is homebound, you can call 1-833-983-0485 to get them signed up to have a vaccine brought directly to them. They are going to be using the Janssen vaccine. So it’s a one and done, very easy, but you need to sign up. There is a quick survey to make sure that you qualify. So you have to be a homebound individual, meaning that there’s really no way for you to leave. So there is a quick survey, but we want all these people to be vaccinated. So please just remember this number, 1-833, but we will put all this information up on the website as well. We’re also working with all the partners to make sure that we capture these individuals. Yesterday we had a clinic for senior housing vaccination. We vaccinated just over 110 individuals from senior housing. It was a great partnership with COA and Marblehead Housing Association. So we got those individuals vaccinated. There was a lot of appreciation, a lot of discussion with these individuals thanking us to have these vaccines available in their hometown. It’s a lot harder for some of these individuals trying to get to a mass vaccination site. So working with the state, we were able to vaccinate these individuals.

3:10 In 28 days from yesterday, we will be doing the second round, the second dose for them. We wanted to make sure that we’re trying to keep it as easy as possible. So before they left, we had them signed up for their second round of vaccinations. It went extremely well, but we just want to mention all that stuff. So kind of where we are with vaccines, as of 321, 3,232,930 doses of COVID-19 vaccine have shipped to Massachusetts. 2,919,765 doses have been administered. So over 1 million people in Massachusetts have been fully vaccinated. Our vaccination percentages in Marblehead are very high, which is great. Obviously, you know, well-educated individuals staying up to date with everything, computer literate or able to reach out for support. I believe our over 75 population has at least 95 of them have at least one dose at this point. So we’re doing very well with that, and we want that to continue. 95% of them? 95% of them. Yep. As far as on March 22nd, now individuals 16 over and certain workers are eligible to go into that certain worker eligibility.

4:46 We’re talking about restaurant and cafe workers, cook service, maintenance staff, managers, cashiers for restaurants. We are talking about food, meat packing, beverage, agriculture, consumer goods, retail, or food service workers, grocery and convenience store workers, food pantry workers or volunteers, medical supply chain workers, vaccine development workers, transit transportation workers, public works, water, wastewater and utility workers, sanitation workers, public health workers, court system workers, judges, prosecutors, defense attorneys, close to the public. We’re talking about other than public works, other than court officers who are listed under first responders, federal directors and funeral workers. So this is a very large group. This is going to take us some time. Unfortunately, we still have a limited supply of vaccine in Massachusetts. We are hoping that that will be a different story come April, but that’s kind of where we are with that. As far as updated orders, we now out of the governor’s office, we had COVID-19 order number 66. So on effective 1201 a.m. on March 22nd, 2021, and all municipalities in the Commonwealth, businesses and other organizations are designated as phase four, step one.

6:17 Enterprises on scheduled, it’s called schedule A, may open their brick and more premises to workers, customers and public. So there’s a lot in this new order that came effective March 22nd. This is all on mass.gov under COVID reopening. So please take a look at all this information. If you have questions regarding your business, please give us a call. We can point you in the right direction. So you should be looking at guidance from mass.gov, the mass department division of labor and Massachusetts EEA. Michelle. Can you check the waiting room? Yeah. Obviously, this self-covers workplace safety standards mandatory travel order. The mandatory travel order has changed to an advisory. So please pay attention to the new advisory, which has changed also on March 22nd. This is taking place of the order. So some updates with that. That’s really the main portion of the COVID update. We’re really trying to switch over to more information on vaccines and the changing of the phases and stuff like that. But all of that information can be found on mass.gov. Any other questions? It’s amazing how much shorter the report’s getting.

7:50 No. So the actual case report that comes out every Friday is increasing in length. I think now it’s 14 pages long. I meant your board report. I mean, obviously, people don’t want to hear about the case. The case is on a day-to-day basis where we’re seeing cases. They really want to move more into the vaccination side and looking to get out of this. Obviously, it’s been over a year. Last week was my 52nd case report. So we’ve been into this well over a year. And yes, we see the light at the end of the tunnel. We still have a lot of ways to go. Obviously, it’s a race to get people vaccinated versus this next coming wave that has started in Europe and hopefully does not continue to build in the United States. We’re not done yet. We are not done yet. I just heard that New York tonight was having some real surge. I don’t know if you heard it, but I just was passing by so I can’t give you the figures or anything because I don’t think I was accurate. I think you’re going to see an uptick in several different states across the country. And like I said, it really is a race to get people vaccinated. Trying to overcome this next surge that could potentially come. Obviously, with the ages, we still continue to see the zero to 19 being one of our more popular age groups that become infected with the virus.

9:34 We’ll probably see more when the high school gets back in full session. And obviously, with that, we will continue to do our job with contact tracing and trying to identify the source. So contact tracing, quarantine, isolation is best possible and working with the schools anytime that’s necessary. But we understand where we are. We understand the governor and the president’s order to try to get kids back in school. Well, Michelle Helene, no further questions. Let’s move on to the big item of the agenda tonight. So we’re going to select our three candidates for the Mental Health Task Force, two citizen candidates and one from health professions. And Michelle, since you’re the chair of our committee, do you want to take the lead on this? Sure. Why don’t we start with the healthcare professionals? Is that okay? We’ve numbered everybody so that we all have the same numbers so we’re not going to cite people by name. Okay. So since those were the ones that started with number one, why don’t we start with that? And we’ll go through them. And just as we discussed in terms of the numbering system, I will just ask you to, you know, I will,

11:18 state the number that we’re discussing, and then I’m going to ask each of you to let me know any comments that you want to make and whether you want to, you know, declare this person as a yes or no or a discussion. Does that sound like how you determined we were going to proceed with this? Well, unless we want to just put a name and nomination if we see a number. I mean, a number. Yeah. We should go through the list. From talking to Todd, we said we were going to kind of go through the list. Oh, I didn’t get that. I didn’t get that message. Todd, isn’t that how we do that? I mean, we could. I mean, you might have had a conversation with him, but I don’t know that conversation. We could do that or we could. Maybe you could. All right. Conversation. Okay. If you want to tell me then. All right. Then, Todd, why don’t you tell me of this list? Why don’t you say the number because there’s just one from the health care professional ones. You want to tell me which number you are leaning to which the one which is the number that you would are choosing. Could I just say something to general before we start because I think that this was a very thorough and I think that people responded to the request.

12:49 And we’ve done a thorough job. I spent this afternoon looking at all of these. I spent several hours looking at all the resumes. And I want to thank everybody that’s applied and as like in anything, some people are going to be appointed and others are not. And it’s not because you weren’t qualified. It’s just because we have to make a choice. And I don’t want to discourage people that don’t get this to apply to other things in town or to us. And I would thank all the people that applied and they were very sincere and very thorough in their applications. Yes. Thank you, Elaine. And I was planning on saying that at the end, but I will say and I didn’t want it to be after the fact. I wanted to know. All right. Well, thank you. You said it. Maybe I’ll say it again after the fact. But in case others join us. But yes, absolutely. There wasn’t one single person who put their name in that that wasn’t, you know, didn’t have a Something to add to this. And I wish that every single person who who put their name in didn’t could be part of this. You know, it’s it really chose it shows a tremendous commitment to, you know, want to step up in and address these issues. So I do really I think we all really appreciate that. I completely agree with both of you. And we have more good candidates than we can than we can accept, which is a shame, but we have our number limits.

14:27 Okay, so I interrupted you, Mr. Chairman, or Dr. Chairman, I apologize. So, all right. So just so we can move through this. Todd, why don’t you let us know which number and we need to discuss. We of course will discuss. But let’s see where we landed in terms of the number of the for the health care professional, which one you were thinking of. I was leaning towards number three. Elaine. I’m leaning towards number three. And I’m leaning towards number three. I’m leaning towards number three. Okay, so for the health care professional. Why don’t we go with number three, and we will, after this meeting, be in touch with the individual that we chose for that position. Sound okay. Okay, and we, that’s good to me. This is not something we need to take a vote on. No, I don’t think so. Right. You’re correct. Oh, I think that’s fine. I mean, you guys have just decided and you can definitely, you know, we can call to a vote if you would like to. But, you know, Michelle, you’re kind of running this portion of it. I think, you know, that all three of you agreed on your applicant for number three and you can move forward with that. Okay, yeah, I guess if it’s something we need to vote on, if there’s any just just repency between us, then maybe we need to go to a vote.

15:58 But since we all agreed, let’s hold it at that. And for that one, I think we’re good. There were far more applicants for the citizen one. So I think we may, we may need to have a little bit more discussion with this one. So, Todd, why don’t you let us know the numbers of the two individuals that you picked for citizen applicants? I chose the top two in my list were four and seven. Okay, so four, I’m writing this down, and seven. And, Elaine. I selected seven and I had a small second choice and three others that were good. Oh, Halle, all right. Let’s let’s hear it. Okay. I really can have a choice of number seven. Why don’t you vote on yours and then I’ll tell you what. All right. Seven. So you have seven and four others. Okay. So I, oh, good. I couldn’t make a decision. I agree with you. Very tough. I selected number. Hold on. Let me go back to my list. I selected number four and number nine.

17:36 And we will sound like we it sounds like we have two already. We’ve got four and number seven. Oh, I said four and nine. I know, but he, but Todd said seven as one of his choices. Yes. Yes. So, so number four and number seven have two votes. Wait, Elaine said that. No, Elaine only said four. No, I said seven. Oh, you did? I thought you said, wait, I’m waiting. Oh, I said seven and I had four at a time. Okay. Wait, I’m kidding. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Not number four, but there were four other people who Elaine couldn’t decide between. I was just going to go with who up, you know, like this, the way it happened. Wait, wait, wait, Hélène, you said four and seven. And then what I thought we would do is go through one round and then another round. So I picked the first round. Okay. So you said four and seven. No, I didn’t have six four and seven. I said seven. You said seven. Yes. And Todd said four and then I said four and nine. Okay. So we have, so you’re saying that we have. Two for four and two for seven. Two for four and two for seven. So there, so, so we’re not going to have any discussion. We’re good. We’re going with four and seven.

19:09 Yes. Okay. So I feel weird that we’re not having any discussion, but I guess that’s, I guess that’s. If you’re doing it with anonymous names, I mean, they, they all had very, they were all very well qualified and they all met the criteria, whether that be professional or citizens. And every one of them had backgrounds that fit their particular place in their application. Wonderful. Okay. Do you, do you want to. Yeah, so I just, I have a few closing comments and statements to make. So, so we’re good with that. Yep. Okay. And just both of the two that you each had a second choices were on my other list. So I’m happy with, with the two that you chose. They each were one of my four. So we, we have a list of other folks who have already agreed to be part of the, of the task force. And we, I, you know, ideally we’re going to come up with a schedule that works with, you know, everybody’s, you know,

20:41 everybody’s schedule moving forward, but it’s impossible to do that for our first meeting. So we, I’m going to call our first meeting for Monday, March 29th at 7 30 p.m. And we will be posting that meeting and I will send out an email to everybody who has agreed to participate, including the individuals that we’ve just chosen and we will get back to you just as soon as we, you know, just as soon as we can tomorrow, maybe tonight. And let you know that you’ve been selected to sit on this task force and we will post that meeting and that will be our first meeting. And then after that, we will come up with a schedule that, that serves everybody’s, that best suits everybody’s schedule and time commitment, etc. And we’ll also work on our revised goals and purpose statement, etc. So that is the plan moving forward. Looks like you have something to say, Todd. Do you have a list of the people who have already, you know, from town departments and stuff who have already agreed on it? I do. I will, I can circulate that and we’ll post that on the website. I mean, it will, I guess my question is, do we want to just announce the entire committee tonight, including who we just chose or, or is it you want to let’s just wait because I just want to ask like the folks on the Council on Aging.

22:22 I’m not sure if they have chosen like which individual they’ve chosen, but I mean, I can kind of just verbally walk through it. You know, I just don’t know for Council on Aging. I don’t know, but we have one second. Let me just pull up this list. One second. Anybody have anything to discuss while you’re looking at it? I just want to thank you for the job that you did because I think you did a very professional job with your, with the way you set up the sheets that we worked on the worksheets. And I appreciate that. Well, thank you all for doing this and reviewing this. And I’m just looking to make sure that we have, I have all the right information. Also, Dr. Chairman, is there any reason why we cannot, we don’t have, can’t announce the names of the ones that we have to take them in suspense? I don’t, I would think we should, we should announce the names. Okay. All right. Yeah, I didn’t know if there was any. So why don’t we just go through the whole list and people on here. Okay. Okay. So I just want to make sure I have like the right, you know, all the right information in front of me. Okay. So hold on. Let me just pull this up. Hold on. Sorry. I wasn’t, for some reason, I didn’t have this all up and ready. So if there’s anything else to do while I’m pulling.

24:11 Well, I would like to ask Todd if I could just give a few sentences about the reopening committee since there’s been no report. Oh, I’m pulling this up. There’s been no report for five weeks. And I spoke with Andrew today and just updated him that most of the work that was being done was working toward going fully in person. So they’ve spent a lot of time in preparation for getting students back in person. They’ve been meeting the principals have been meeting with their teachers, with the students, with the parents. MEA has had several meetings. The superintendent’s been very busy working with, with the principals, with all the other leaders of leadership. And everything K-6 has been going very smoothly. The classrooms are working out well. A lot of people who have been in the class, that are parents or students or teachers, they know that the class looks very different. The desks and chairs are spread out. A lot of the equipment has been moved out into the corridors. They’ve even had the fire department come and make sure that the corridors were not blocking anything for egress. They’re now talking about trying to get outside long because they had shorter mask breaks and snack breaks.

25:49 And they are not back to lunch yet. I think that’s happening, I think, after school vacation. The pool testing is going well, both with the student body and with the athletes. They jumped from 555 the first week of pool testing to 624 to over 800. Kids are even asking their parents to sign them up for the pool testing. It’s gotten to be a thing that people want to do, that the kids don’t want to be missing out on something. So even with pool testing, it’s peer pressure. So I think that was cute. The athletics are going pretty well. And also, they’re now talking at the high school, which is, correct me if I’m wrong, Andrew, but they’re still doing hybrid. Is that correct? They’re not back? That’s correct. I think they’re coming back with the 15th of April. Is that the right date? That’s correct. Okay, so I just didn’t want to make that mistake. But they are now talking about various events, whether it be prom or plays or graduation or all those things that have to come out, come from DESI and from the CDC. So we’re not necessarily from the CDC, we have to follow CDC guidelines. But DESI is going to now, they’re waiting for that to occur for them to give them some guidelines on that.

27:25 So, you know, everything is almost April and things are winding down. As we’re winding up, things are winding down. So I think that’s a good way for me to leave it. But all in all, people seem to think that everything is going as well as it can be. As Andrew said, we’re going to expect to have some incidents. And they’ve talked about, if it’s with faculty, they’ve talked about getting extra substitutes, they’re looking for that. And so, you know, a lot of people are substitute teachers, get in touch with the superintendent’s office, I guess. So he’s even offered to substitute. So whoever gets him as a classroom teacher for an hour or so, they would be very lucky. So, as I said, all is moving along as well as can be expected. Yeah, I’ll add something quickly to that. I did, you know, Dan Bauer from the high school did ask me to come and meet with him and some of the student liaisons asking questions about a whole host of different items that, you know, so everything from graduation to prom to senior show, powder puff football, senior banquet, senior outing, pep rallies, bag toss tournament concerts and other extracurricular clubs.

28:57 So obviously, you know, this is the same question that most schools in Massachusetts are going to have. So rather than, you know, the town of Marblehead set up all the guidelines to this. We quickly went to the state and said, hey, these are being asked of us. We think the state needs to provide guidelines to this. So we looked directly to Mass Department of Public Health and to the Division of Labor Standards. They quickly came back to us and said, we have passed these questions on to Desi and Desi will provide guidance for all these different events. So as soon as that’s out, Desi will provide that guidance and we’ll make sure that everybody is aware of it. If there are questions regarding that, it will follow the same kind of command. It will go through me back up to the state and see if we can get some guidance on any additional questions and then back down to the school. Most schools will have similar questions and Desi will have to push that information out at the same time. We want to be very, you know, fluid. We want the same answers and the same things going on from town to town. We don’t want to say, you know, well, this is being done in Marblehead. Why can’t this be done in Peabody or in Swamscott? It should be equal like all the regulations have been equal across the state. We all follow the same sports guidelines and all the other guidelines. They should be doing the exact same thing for all these high school guidelines too. We know these events are very special to seniors and so we want to make sure that the state has these questions early on and they can try to provide these guidelines as quickly as possible.

30:31 Thank you, Andrew, for adding that. Yep. Thanks for your report, Elaine. All right. You ready? Ready. Okay, so representative from the Board of Health, that will be me, representative from Board of Selectmen, Moses Grader, representative from school administration, Dan Bauer, principal of the high school, representative from school guidance department, Jeff Newsom, that’s the guidance counselor at the village school, director of the Marblehead counseling center, Ben Day, representative from the Council on Aging. I’m not sure if it will be Lisa Hooper or Karen Smith. Those are the two names I have. I need to check with them. Healthcare professional, Kimberly Howard, and two Marblehead citizens, Melissa Kapplovich and Kimberly Levensal. Great. It’s going to be a great group. Congratulations to you all. Yeah, thank you to everybody. And we appreciate everyone who submitted their applications and hope to engage with everybody who is interested in working on this. There’ll be no doubt plenty of opportunities for people to work on, you know, activities involving improvements in mental health in town,

32:06 whether or not you’re on the task force. I have one question to ask you because I’m looking at my calendar. Does it matter that that the holiday of Passover doesn’t end until 750 at night on the 29th? Would that matter to anybody? You’ll have to maybe just look at that. We could talk offline about that, but I just noticed. That is true. But there is, it’s a, it’s day three. No, it’s the last day. What’s that? I think the last day. No, no, I’m sorry. So it’s not, it’s not a, it’s not a Seder day. So, all right. Well, that’s good. All right. Given that it’s not a Seder, I. That’s okay. All right. I just. Imagine that that’s an issue for anybody, but if you think it is, then. I don’t think I thought it was the last day of the holiday. It’s not. I was. Yeah, I’m on the last day is the fifth. And that is a day that some people observe. I’m sorry. So apologize. Just trying to be, just trying to be cautious about everything. I’m sorry. It is on my calendar, but it is on my calendar listed as Easter Monday.

33:41 And I, if somebody has something to contribute about that, because that is not a holiday that I observe. But I don’t know what. Easter Monday is the fifth.

34:02 No, it just comes up on the calendar as Easter Monday. It is a business day and that is a, you know, offices are open. Oh, all right. That’s the wrong day. Okay. So I was looking at the wrong day. All right. So it’s not even, it’s not Easter Monday. So I think it’s called out as Easter Monday on the calendar. Okay. I didn’t know if that was something we needed to be. I thought it was a day after Easter, which is that would be the fifth. Okay. All right. We’re trying to make it very sensitive. Okay. All right. We’re good. So Andrea, will you post that tomorrow, please? Yeah, we will post that tomorrow. Great. So is our next meeting on the sixth? I think that would work well. So I have a question about the sixth. I have a meeting on the sixth at, that starts at 6 p.m. That starts at 8 p.m. So I have the next meeting as the 13th as, because there’s, there’s a, it’s kind of, the end of March kind of adds some additional days. So the 13th is the second Tuesday of the month, which is our original. Every other week and I’m not available on the 13th. Okay. Should we, I think it’s okay to kind of steer back towards our second Tuesday of the month and then have more meetings as needed.

35:33 Elaine can’t do the third. I know. Can we do the 14th? Actually, can we do the, that presents a problem. Can we discuss this later? Because we’ve got all these people waiting. We’ve got all these people waiting. We’ve got people waiting and it seems like we all were counting on something else. And we’ve all made plans around that, around the something else. I just, I don’t know, something came up. It’s just a meeting that through my graduate school that I just really would like to attend. We’ll send some emails out with different dates. Okay. Okay. I happen to be chairing the task force against discrimination on the 13th and I made it specifically because the Board of Health was meeting every other week. That’s fine. That’s fine. We’ll work around it. We’ll make it work. So we have a public participation agenda item. If there’s anybody who wants to speak, please raise your hand and I’ll call you in the order that you raise your hand. If nobody has anything to say, I’ll give it just another moment. Then I think we can get a motion to adjourn.

37:03 I’ll second that. I’m a sales. In favor. In favor. Dr. Belchbeger. In favor.