WCHD’s child safety kits distributed to police officers

The Whitley County Health Department and local police will soon be taking additional measures to try and prevent some deaths involving young children.

Whitley County Health Department Public Health Director Marcy Rein said that the health department ordered child safety kits to childproof doors in homes, which were recently distributed to police officers in Williamsburg, Corbin and Whitley County.

“This is so officers can carry it in their vehicles and hand them out when they see a need for families to potentially use those,” Rein told the Whitley County Board of Health during its recent quarterly meeting.

Rein said that the kits are partially in response to a 2019 hot car death, which resulted from the child getting out of the home without the parent or guardian knowing that it happened.

She said that Williamsburg police had requested the kits after seeing a trend of young children getting out of homes without the knowledge of parents or guardians, and the health department decided it was a good idea to get the kits for all police agencies in Whitley County.

Every child fatality is reviewed by a multi-agency, multi-disciplinary team to look for injury prevention opportunities, Rein said.

The child safety kits were purchased using federal funding for maternal child health and child fatality review funds.

The health department purchased 100 larger kits and 50 lever door locks to share with police.

In other business, the board:

• Received a COVID-19 update. As of March 21 there were 29 active COVID-19 cases reported in Whitley County. There have been a total of 14,079 cases since the pandemic began. These numbers don’t include people testing positive using at home testing kits.

A total of 172 confirmed COVID-19 deaths have been reported in Whitley County.

Rein noted that Kentucky has one of the most rigorous COVID-19 fatality review processes in the country.

About 34.5 percent of Whitley County residents have received COVID-19 vaccinations and boosters.

• Approved a fee increase for septic tank installation inspections. The fee will go from $175 to $195. The increase was to cover an increase in the state’s portion of that fee, which went from $30 to $50 per inspection. There are about 175 of these inspections annually in Whitley County.
• Received an update on usage of the Whitley County Health Department app, which has had almost 5,000 downloads as of mid-March. Rein noted that the most commonly visited features on the app have to do with people looking for health department services, people looking up housing and utilities, and people looking up recovery resources. To find the app, go to the app store on your device and look for Whitley County resources.
• Scheduled its next meeting date for June 20 at 7 p.m. The meeting will either be held at the health department’s Williamsburg office or virtually.