Health Director Reports On A Busy Year

By Jan Howard

Director of Health Donna McCarthy told the Newtown District Department of Health Board of Directors Wednesday that Newtown has had a “lively year” with ticks and Lyme disease.

She said her department made “lots of effort” to get information out so that people could protect themselves against tick bites and Lyme disease. She said literature regarding Lyme disease is to be distributed in the schools.

Ms McCarthy said 24 percent of the ticks turned in to the department tested positive for Lyme disease. The good news, however, she said, is that 78 to 80 percent of them were not engorged, which means they were turned in before people could become infected. This shows that people are checking themselves regularly for ticks after being outside, she said.

Reports are no longer required from labs, and there is less reporting from doctors, she noted, so statistics regarding the disease are not as available.

Dr Thomas Draper, the board’s medical advisor, said that while doctors may make a diagnosis and treat a patient if Lyme is suspected but not proven, actual lab results and a rash are sure indications of Lyme. “I think lab reporting is helpful,” he said.

First Selectman Herb Rosenthal said that he would ask the Connecticut Council of Municipalities to consider asking that labs be again mandated to report Lyme disease statistics.

Ms McCarthy reported that the flu shot clinics had done well this year, and that use of Kevin’s Community Center in the Health District offices is increasing. “We see more walk-ins,” she said. “It’s pretty busy.”

In other business, the Board of Directors approved unanimously to amend the 2002–03 fiscal year budget to incorporate the Connecticut Department of Health carryover funds received of $24,244.13, adopted a resolution to authorize Ms McCarthy to apply for bioterrorism response/emergency response preparedness funding.