Chambana Sun

Family Health Care Of Hoopeston issued the following announcement on July 31.

This week Gibson Area Hospital administered 446 COVID tests through our drive through site, (these numbers don’t include tests done at the hospital for surgeries or at our 15 clinic sites) resulting in 26 positive cases, 1 in Ford County.

Since June 24th, GAH has administered almost 2,000 COVID tests through our drive through site, resulting in 61 positive cases, 10 of those in Ford County. Ford County acknowledges other positive cases from people who are tested in other counties, but live in Ford County. Not all Ford County positive cases come from the Hospital.

As a Hospital and as a community (Gibson City), our numbers have been relatively low since March. But please do not let the fact that we have low numbers give you a false sense of security or immunity from COVID.

People from outside of the county are coming to GAH to get tested because we do testing in-house and can provide results in 2 hours vs. 2 or 3 days.

61 people with COVID have driven through town, to the hospital, and tested positive. Most people are not sick and do not know they have it.

The Hospital does call patients with results, but we do not do contact tracing of patients, that is done by the Health Department. And when most cases are outside of Ford County, that means Iroquois, Livingston, Vermillion, DeWitt, McLean, or Champaign health departments are the ones doing the follow up. With Clinics and services in seven different counties, we cover a large service area, so we see cases from all of these counties.

Ford County health department is doing a great job in following up with Ford County positives. The Hospital and the Health Department work hand in hand on sharing of information and working together to keep local infections low.

For those 61 people with COVID who came to town, we can’t tell you if they went to Casey’s for gas or County Market for food, or ate at a restaurant. The health department from that county will be the one to notify businesses if they are at risk.

But my point is, COVID patients drive to and through our town every week. It is part of having a hospital in town. So please do not have a false sense of security that it isn’t here. So what can we do?

We can do what the CDC and IDPH recommend. MASKS WORK. Social Distancing works. Washing your hands often works.

We are having a community celebration on August 7 with WCIA 3 Our Town. A great way to show off Gibson City. However, please follow the guidelines. Here is how it is supposed to work.

When you are inside, in close quarters, you should have a mask on. Yes, if you are trying to eat or drink, you need to lower or move the mask for that, but that doesn’t mean take it off. It can be done. I do it myself.

When you are Outside. If you can social distance, you do not need to have a mask on. But that means being apart enough not to spread the virus through the air. If you are in a close group outside or can’t social distance, which is fine, you should have a mask on. It’s that simple.

Many of you know I have helped coach the varsity football team here in Gibson City for 17 years now. If you happen to see us practice recently, you would notice, during agilities, or individual drills, where we can social distance, we don’t wear masks. But when we huddle up and run offense or defense plays, everyone has a mask on, even the coaches.

This is NOT a political statement. I don’t care if you are Republican or Democrat or Libertarian. I don’t care the color of your skin or your nationality. And COVID doesn’t care either. What I do care about is the people, family, friends, in the communities that GAH serves. And I live in Gibson City, so here is most important for me personally. MASKS work. They protect you, me, your family, my family, younger people, older people, everyone. I want the school to have a full, successful year. I want everyone to continue to live a free, healthy, happy life here and everywhere. But it takes all of us, working together, to make this happen.

The Hospital will continue to provide the drive through test site for the foreseeable future (the supply chain is tightening again, so we are scrambling to get tests as fast as we can). GAH will continue to provide the high quality, customer service care you know us for. Our Mission is simple: to provide personalized, professional healthcare services to the residents of the communities we serve.

Original source can be found here.

Source: Family Health Care Of Hoopeston