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Ingham County Health Officer Reflects On One Year Of COVID

Linda Vail and state Chief Medical Executive, Dr. Joneigh Khaldun visit a drive-thru vaccination clinic in the county.
Joneigh Khaldun/ Twitter
Linda Vail and state Chief Medical Executive, Dr. Joneigh Khaldun visited one of the county's drive-thru vaccination sites in February.

One year ago, today, Michigan confirmed its first cases of the coronavirus.

Since then, there have been almost 600,000 cases of COVID-19 in the state. Nearly 16,000 Michiganders have died because of the disease.

However, progress is being made to vaccinate residents. More than 1.5 million people have been inoculated.

In Ingham County, Health Officer Linda Vail has led the efforts to curb the spread of the virus and now, vaccine administration.

WKAR’s Sophia Saliby spoke with her to reflect on the anniversary.

Interview Highlights

On What She Learned Managing The County’s COVID Response

I learned that basically there are times when I'm going to have to say something and be prepared to come back a few days later and say, "Yeah, that was wrong, and now here we go forward with other information." And it's not because we don't know what's going on or I didn't do the best I could. It's just simply the fact that things evolve and change and unravel that quickly.

On How Guidance Like Wearing Masks Has Proven To Be Effective

If you look at where our flu cases are, right now, we are seeing an unprecedentedly low flu season. It basically is [that] mask wearing, staying home when you're sick, washing your hands [and] avoiding gatherings actually works when it comes to these kinds of viruses and preventing illness and deaths. So, it's been very effective. It's proven in the flu numbers and probably would have been something that we could have been a little bit more assertive on earlier on.

On New Initiatives The County Is Doing To Boost Equity In Vaccine Access

It targets or it addresses those specific zip codes that have this high SVI and starts to basically look at community clinics, pop up clinics [and] a mobile van that we have that is not a "get-on the van and get a vaccine" thing but allows us to have supplies and vaccines and everything just ready to bring to these different sites. So, churches, community centers, events like that will be part of this initiative, as well as just outreach and engagement at, you know, a variety of levels in order to make sure that we engage with and encourage as well as get vaccinated a population of people that are particularly at risk.

Interview Transcript

Sophia Saliby: This is All Things Considered on WKAR. I’m Sophia Saliby.

One year ago, today, Michigan confirmed its first cases of the coronavirus. Since then, there have been almost 600,000 cases of COVID-19 in the state. Nearly 16,000 Michiganders have died because of the disease.

But progress is being made to vaccinate residents. More than 1.5 million people have been inoculated.

In Ingham County, Health Officer Linda Vail has led the efforts to curb the spread of the virus and now, vaccine administration. She joins me now to reflect on this anniversary. Thank you for being here.

Linda Vail: Thank you, Sophia.

Saliby: Can you tell me about the moment that you learned COVID-19 would impact Ingham County residents?

Vail: Yeah, I think really what it was when the first case was announced in the state of Michigan, and then of course, our first case was announced, I believe, the very next day. So, I was in Washington D.C. actually. I was an invited speaker at a conference about opioids and medication-assisted treatment in correctional facilities.

RELATED: Ingham County Monitors One Potential Coronavirus Case

And fortunately, [I] had finished the presentation that I was supposed to do and was quickly distracted with all of the phone calls and everything around the announcement of the first case. And [I] also quickly rescheduled my flight and got back home as soon as possible because it was clear that it was not going to be good to be in Washington D.C. for yet another day.

Saliby: What have you learned in this past year, kind of, leading the public health efforts of the county?

Vail: Well, some of the things I've learned is that as much as we try to predict what we expect is going to 

I learned that basically there are times when I'm going to have to say something and be prepared to come back a few days later and say, "Yeah, that was wrong, and now here we go forward with other information."

happen next, it's been a very unpredictable virus in a lot of ways. So, looking at it at the beginning, it was like this is a typical respiratory virus. It's going to be worse than flu, but in a lot of ways flu-like. It just kind of unraveled very differently than one would have anticipated in a lot of ways and does not follow a lot of typical trends and patterns of a typical respiratory virus and, at the same time, is very much a respiratory virus.

So, I learned that basically there are times when I'm going to have to say something and be prepared to come back a few days later and say, "Yeah, that was wrong, and now here we go forward with other information." And it's not because we don't know what's going on or I didn't do the best I could. It's just simply the fact that things evolve and change and unravel that quickly.

Saliby: Given all that, is there anything you would have done differently?

Vail: Oh, my goodness, you know, a crystal ball, that would have told me exactly what was going to happen over the next year. [I] probably would have put masking up in the high priority category a little sooner.

I mean, we went from, you know, "Don't get a mask," which was actually advice that came about, really, because of the shortages and masks and our need to protect health care workers. And you know, we're here mid-March almost, by April 1, I was saying, you know, "I really strongly encouraged mask wearing." So, it wasn't very long before we did make that change. But at the same time, it was strongly encouraged. So, we went through lots of period of time of strongly encouraging before we said "No, this really is required in public, and we really should deny people entry if they're not wearing masks in public."And while that has gotten its share of being a lightning rod of political attacks and those sorts of things, it has proven to be very effective.

It basically is [that] mask wearing, staying home when you're sick, washing your hands [and] avoiding gatherings actually works when it comes to these kinds of viruses and preventing illness and deaths.

If you look at where our flu cases are, right now, we are seeing an unprecedentedly low flu season. It basically is [that] mask wearing, staying home when you're sick, washing your hands [and] avoiding gatherings actually works when it comes to these kinds of viruses and preventing illness and deaths. So, it's been very effective. It's proven in the flu numbers and probably would have been something that we could have been a little bit more assertive on earlier on.

Saliby: The county was just awarded more vaccine doses from the state for a pilot project meant to make distribution more equitable. Can you talk about the county's plan to improve vaccine access to vulnerable populations?

Vail: Basically, it is a number of zip codes in the area that have what we call a high Social Vulnerability Index (SVI). That SVI is based on things not just race, race is one of them, [but] poverty, access to healthy foods, access to transportation, distance to say a provider's office [and] those sorts of things.

So, even in rural counties, we will see some higher social vulnerability and not necessarily a population that is predominantly people of color. So, it is not always aligned with that, although, in our urban cores, we do find a lot of that.

So, it targets or it addresses those specific zip codes that have this high SVI and starts to basically look at community clinics, pop up clinics [and] a mobile van that we have that is not a "get-on the van and get a vaccine" thing but allows us to have supplies and vaccines and everything just ready to bring to these different sites. So, churches, community centers, events like that will be part of this initiative, as well as just outreach and engagement at, you know, a variety of levels in order to make sure that we engage with and encourage as well as get vaccinated a population of people that are particularly at risk.

Saliby: Linda Vail is Ingham County's Health Officer. Thank you for joining me.

Vail: Thank you, Sophia.

This conversation has been edited for clarity and conciseness.

Sophia Saliby is the local producer and host of All Things Considered, airing 4pm-7pm weekdays on 90.5 FM WKAR.
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