by Sarah Thomack
St. Joseph Post
As more information about the coronavirus or COVID-19 comes out everyday, local health officials urge residents to get information from trusted sources.
Connie Werner with the St. Joseph Health Department says information is always changing as it’s a disease process health officials are learning about in real time.
“As things change, they change the guidance, they change the information, so the first thing that I would tell you is just to stay plugged in,” Werner says. “Make sure that the sources you’re getting your information from are reputable - The CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) and the WHO (World Health Organization) are the primary sources. The Department of Health and Senior Service or the state of Missouri Health Department would be another source as well, but this information is always changing based on new information gathered.”
One of the things that has evolved as health officials learn more is the name of the disease.
“It used to be called Wuhan virus, well we don’t want that because that’s putting a stigma on a place, we want to look at what the virus is," Werner says. "So then it was novel coronavirus-19. Ok, novel means new - new to humans - coronavirus is the family of viruses and 19, the year that it was discovered. So because then that was too long of a name, they shortened it to COVID, (COronaVIrus Disease) 19.”
Werner says information on the coronavirus is spreading quickly and coming from all directions.
“It’s very easy to pick up on one piece of information and run with it, especially with social media, things can spread without knowing where the initial information came from,” Werner says. “I think what I would want to emphasize is that this information is scary, the information is new and it seems to be bad news every time we turn on the news. So we don’t want to make it worse unnecessarily, we don’t want to spread information that causes more confusion or misconceptions or panic.”
Werner says the highest degree of complications with the coronavirus are with people who are older or have underlying health conditions.
“They have diabetes, they have high blood pressure, they have lung disease, heart disease, a whole host of things," Werner says "If they have underlying health conditions, it’s called medically fragile, you have other things going on with you, it does put you at a greater risk for having more severe complications from the disease.”
Werner adds that about 80% of people, when they get the COVID-19 disease have had mild symptoms.
“So that’s good news, most of the people getting it will just be mildly inconvenienced, but because you don’t know who that person is that might have those complications, the best thing that we can try to do to tell you is just to do the best you can to prevent getting the illness in the first place.”
Werner says at the St. Joseph Health Department, they keep up with things by talking multiple times a day with the state of Missouri who stays in contact with the CDC. Locally, they are keeping the lines of communication open with various community partners that may be impacted by any disease outbreak or spread of COVID-19.
“This would be medical groups, schools, various places that might have an impact,” Werner says. “We are working to get information out to the faith based communities and to employers, so we are working just to make sure that that line of communication is open and everyone is getting information that they might use for planning purposes.”
Werner encourages residents to take the same safety and health measures you usually do during cold and flu season such as frequent hand washing and staying home when you’re sick.
For more information, visit the CDC’s website or contact the St. Joseph Health Department at (816) 271-4725.