Tag: Shelby County Health Department

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Vaccine Crisis Politics: Commission Meeting Previews Next Year’s Election Divide

CREDIT: Jackson Baker

Not that it is, or should be, the most significant fact to emerge from last week’s COVID-19 debacle in Shelby County, but, all the same, it’s a fact: The 2022 county election has begun, with the sides  being chosen and the weapons weighed.

Much of that became obvious at a special called meeting of the Shelby County Commission on Friday, February 26th, when the 13 commissioners were given a chance to interrogate County Mayor Lee Harris regarding the Tennessee Department of Health’s charges of mismanagement of COVID-19 vaccination by the Shelby County Health Department, resulting in TDH’s yanking responsibility for allocating vaccines locally and reassigning that function to the city of Memphis.

In the course of two hours of tense and sometimes volatile questioning of Harris, who remained in his upstairs office and appeared virtually via webinar, the commissioners, most of whom were seated in their regular chamber seats in the auditorium of the Vasco Smith County Building, cleaved unmistakably along partisan lines. 

Jackson Baker

Four of the body’s five Republicans — Mick Wright, David Bradford, Amber Mills, and Mark Billingsley — directly challenged the county administration, with Bradford, Mills, and Billingsley questioning the leadership of Harris, a Democrat, and Wright demanding an accounting from Shelby County Health Department Director Alisa Haushalter, who was absent from the session and, in fact, had, as Harris announced at the meeting, tendered her resignation that very day.

Harris — who declined, as he said, to engage in “navel-gazing”— kept a solemn mien as he stressed the need to “remediate” the situation, going forward, and fielded inquiries about the imbroglio and its details, including spoilage and subsequent wastage of an alleged 2,500 doses of Pfizer vaccine, the purported stockpiling of some 30,000 doses, unauthorized vaccination of children, possible theft of vaccine from the Pipkin vaccination site, and much more.

There were references in state documents to a “power struggle” between the county and Memphis city government over vaccine administration. Harris denied knowledge of any such development, but Billingsley reinforced that meme by lengthily extolling what he portrayed as Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland‘s filling a void with a display of “leadership.”

Bllingsley, a former commission chairman, is widely regarded as being a likely GOP candidate in 2022 to oppose Harris’ re-election. Another Republican known to be considering a race for county mayor next year is the well-connected Frank Colvett Jr., the current chairman of the Memphis City Council.

In normal circumstances, partisan differences on the county commission are not hard and fast, and allegiances are formed across party lines. (So are antagonisms: One of Harris’ persistent critics is Democratic member Edmund Ford Jr., who chimed in his discontent Friday along with the aforementioned Republicans.) But there was a drawing together on the Democratic side as well; Democratic Commissioners Van Turner and Reginald Milton rose to Harris’ defense on Friday with expressions of praise for his conduct of the mayoral office.

Turner even seemed to imply that the state’s action reflected a bias of Republican state government against Shelby County as a “step-child,” and noted that equivalent vaccine mishaps in Knox County had largely escaped censure by the TDH.

The current crisis will eventually be resolved or it won’t, but in the meantime it has offered a preview of a partisan divide, which may partially heal over but is bound to become more pronounced the closer we come to election year 2022.

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State: No Harm From Expired Vaccines

CREDIT: Tero Vesalainen | Dreamstime

Tero Vesalainen | Dreamstime

A state health official said no harm will come to Shelby Countians who received an expired COVID-19 vaccine from the Shelby County Health Department, though the shot may be less effective.

Dr. Lisa Piercey, Commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Health (TDH), said Tuesday, March 2nd, that many from the Memphis area have contacted her office recently, worried they received an expired dose of the vaccine. Piercey said many have a paper record of their vaccine from the health department that shows their shot had expired, sometimes more than two weeks before they received it.

Piercey said her office investigated, and she believes many of these instances can be linked to a clerical error by the health department. Many sheets with an expired date were printed and taken to a vaccine site here, she said. However, TDH is not “resting on that assertion as a final decision. We’re verifying those cases ourselves.” But she said TDH believes the “vast majority” of the cases were clerical.
State of Tennessee

Dr. Lisa Piercey

“Nothing bad is going to happen if you get an expired vaccine,” Piercey said. “The worst thing that can happen is that the vaccine is not as effective as a temperature-controlled or unexpired vaccine would be.”

A state investigation of the health department’s management of the vaccine rollout here uncovered 2,400 doses that had to be discarded because they were allowed to be defrosted but weren’t used. State health officials found six instances of these expiration events in February. The investigation results in the resignation of SCHD director Alisa Haushalter on Friday, February 26th.

Piercey said her team and personnel from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are on the ground in Shelby County. They are pulling together data to help ensure the temperature integrity of vaccines here.

State of Tennessee

State officials will begin vaccinating those in the 1c population beginning Monday. The group includes those aged 16 and older with high-risk medical conditions like obesity, COPD, and diabetes. Piercey said this group includes more than 1.1 million Tennesseans and the state “unfortunately has high rates of chronic diseases.”

Moving into the next phase comes as a “large surplus” of vaccines are expected to flow to Tennessee in the next two to three weeks. This surge of vaccines includes the newly approved Johnson & Johnson vaccine, Piercey said.

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Amid Re-shuffling of Vaccine Policy, Harris Keeps Stiff Upper Lip

Harris on Zoom call with Commission

“I don’t think there’s a lot of time right now to do a lot of navel-gazing. We need to keep on plowing here and moving forward.” That was Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris’ way, at a Friday afternoon press conference, of summing up what had to have been one of the most harrowing weeks that any public figure has endured of late.

During the past week, 1) a 100-year snow caused a water crisis and immobilized his and other local jurisdictions, which found themselves locked down, not by government mandate, but by Mother Nature; 2) a county vaccine-distribution program, already regarded as problematic, was halted by state edict (not without some subtle shaming by state authorities) and turned over to the city of Memphis and other local agencies, public and private; 3) the director of the county Health Department, Alisa Haushalter, resigned amid a widening scandal related to a state investigation revealing the spoiling locally of 2,500 unused vaccine doses.

Prior to the press conference, Harris had spent a visibly uncomfortable two hours sitting Buddha-like in a special called meeting of the Shelby County Commission, whose members took turns grilling him on the import and details of the vaccine debacle. There was concern among some commissioners about an alleged “power struggle” between city and county. Commissioner Van Turner rejected what he saw as a misleading sub-text here and there questioning the mayor’s performance.

There was little brand-new information adduced in the dialogue with the commission, aside from the revelation of the Haushalter departure, which had leaked out earlier Friday, and references to “suspicious activity” and alleged theft of vaccine from the Pipkin/Fairgrounds vaccine-distribution site that had stirred law enforcement inquiries at the site. Going forward, Pipkin will be operated by the  by the city of Memphis, in tandem with UT Health Sciences.

In the later press conference, Harris revisited some of the content of the commision meeting. In his Zoom talk with reporters, he shouldered the potentially humiliating loss of surrendering responsibility for vaccine storage. He accepted it in the spirit of “it-is-what-it-is” and vowed to seek “a new working relationship and a clean slate” working in harness with the state, the city, and the other agencies charged now with distribution of vaccines and administration of vaccinations.

Harris vowed to “put forth the best practices” and said he was having “departments engaged in remediation planning” and ”moving their focus away from vaccine administration.” He said he was having daily conversations with Lisa Piercey, director of the state Health Department of Health, who on Monday publicly terminated the county Health Department’s responsibility for storage and allocation of vaccine supplies.

Harris was diplomatic about how it came to pass that Haushalter resigned. “We had been in conversation about the path forward and the appropriate path forward at this juncture, based on what had happened and based on what Director Haushalter wants to do. … I agreed with her decision to resign. So I prefer to, you know, try to treat all our employees with respect and dignity, and particularly because all of our employees devoted their careers to service or community helping. So the decision was ultimately made, that she was resigning, and I accepted that resignation.”

Haushalter, who did not attend either the commission meeting or the press conference, will cease her duties as of March 15th, but will evidently remain on the county’s human resources roster until March 31st. Haushalter had been appointed to her directorship by former county Mayor Mark Luttrell and was inherited by Harris when he began his mayoralty in 2018.

Said Harris: “All of us are learning about the wasted dosage, that there were doses expiring in the pharmacy, and so forth. And so we’re gonna have to work hard to rebuild trust. … I’ve talked about making sure that we change out some of those personnel that have responsibility for management.” As for replacing Haushalter, “We’ll go through a process of trying to identify a really incredible candidate for this time. I mean, this is a very unique time that I don’t think any of us have seen in our lifetime. Our public health employees are burning the candle at both ends. … They’ve been working extremely hard. And I think we have an opportunity here to get someone who is poised for this moment.”

Asked about his ability to interface positively with others, Harris said, “I have a good relationship with at least the executive branch of the city. And with respect to … other folks in town, with respect to the commission, a great working relationship with them. I think this is just a challenging period for everyone, particularly, you know, all of us on the Joint Task Force. You know, we’re all exhausted, because of the pandemic. We’re all frustrated. We all want things faster. We all want more quickly, we all want to be better. But I think on the whole, given where we are on such a tough road ahead. I’m pretty blessed.”

Harris’ determination to discover silver linings extended to one of the revelations from the state investigation that resulted in this week’s reordering of responsibilities — the fact of 50,000 unused vaccine doses in Shelby County. This extra inventory, he noted, happened to be the solution to the mounting determination in various quarters to reopen the schools and simultaneously to vaccinate Shelby County’s teachers.

“That was always the plan.” And, Harris said, it began to seem like it was a possibility during the snowstorm, around February, when we started saying, ‘Okay, we’re going to reopen!’”

Harris concluded his press availability with a promise to be forthcoming with the public henceforward. “So please,bear with me, okay?”

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Health Department: Police Said Not Enough Evidence to Report Vaccine Theft

CREDIT: Tero Vesalainen | Dreamstime

Tero Vesalainen | Dreamstime

The Shelby County Health Department (SCHD) said a law enforcement official said there was insufficient information to report theft in the incident allegedly involving stolen COVID-19 vaccines earlier this month.

Tennessee Department of Health (TDH) officials said Friday morning that a volunteer at the Pipkin Building vaccine site stole syringes filled with the COVID-19 drug. That announcement comes in the wake of broader accusations by the state that the health department is mishandling the vaccine rollout.

The SCHD released this statement about the theft Friday afternoon:    

“Our understanding is that in the beginning of February, a site supervisor received information that a volunteer might have engaged in suspicious behavior. Although there were no witnesses to a theft, other staff were suspicious of the volunteer, who is a medical professional.

“The Shelby County Health Department removed the volunteer from the premises and the site supervisor contacted law enforcement regarding the incident. Law enforcement concluded that there was insufficient information to file a report of any theft or unlawful conduct.”

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State Department of Health Pulls County Health Department Out of Vaccine-Distribution Loop

CREDIT: Tero Vesalainen | Dreamstime

In the wake of its most severe and prolonged weather emergency in recent history, Shelby County received another shock Tuesday with the announcement by the state Department of Health that the Shelby County Health Department has mismanaged storage, allocation, and distribution of COVID-19 vaccine. Tero Vesalainen | Dreamstime

Dr. Lisa Piercey, director of the TDH, said investigators from her department had, on an emergency weekend visit to Memphis, concluded that some 2,400 doses of temperature-sensitive Pfizer vaccine had been allowed to spoil before being distributed and were subsequently junked. The investigators had also determined that the Health Department was in possession of an inventory of some 50,000 doses — 30,000 more than the TDH had anticipated.

Those discoveries prompted a significant revision of how vaccines will be delivered henceforth to Shelby County, Piercey said. At least for the short run, they will not go to the Health Department for further allocation but will be delivered directly to the distribution sites of participating partners, which include the City of Memphis, UT Center for Health Sciences, and numerous other agencies, public and private, offering vaccination services.

Meanwhile, the TDH has dispatched personnel to embed with the Health Department as advisors. Piercey could offer no long-term prognosis on how long the new arrangement will last.

Dr. Shelley Fiscus of the TDH said that the spoiled Pfizer doses never left the premises of the in-house Health Department pharmacy that was the starting point of the local distribution network, but had been thawed along with doses that were distributed to vaccination sites. The surplus doses were refrigerated and then discarded after they had reached their expiration date.

This process occurred several times, beginning on February 3rd, and only on occasion could be blamed on the week of bad weather, the TDH investigation found. Poor “communication” was alleged to be a major cause of the spoliations.

Terming himself “absolutely supportive” of the state Department’s actions, Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris pronounced the discovered disruptions “gut-wrenching” and said he had terminated the county’s site manager who had managed the relationship with the pharmacy and had also requested for the pharmacist “to be removed.” He also said he had launched an internal investigation to complement the state review.

A public chorus of indignation on social media sites, which had previously focused on criticism of the Health Department’s restrictions and had increased with the snafus at the Pipkin vaccination site (now and henceforth to be managed by city government in connection with UT) began to focus on the new revelations. And members of the Shelby County Commission, many of whom had withheld public criticism earlier, were coming forward with expressions of concern.

“There’s no excuse for having to dump the vaccine,” said Commissioner Van Turner, although he said, in taking note of hits that the Health Department’s Alisa Haushalter was taking, that she “could have been better supported.” Commissioner Mick Wright, who has often slammed the Health Department for “insensitivity” in its dealing with small businesses and citizens, called for the County Commission to be directly involved in the deliberations of the city-county Covid-19 task force.

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Five Businesses Closed on COVID-19 Violations

CREDIT: SCHD/Facebook

SCHD/Facebook

The Shelby County Health Department (SCHD) announced the closure of five restaurants/bars after Health Directive 17 compliance inspections held on February 5th.

The businesses will each be closed for 14 days, “due to multiple documented violations of requirements and provisions,” according to SCHD.

The locations closed were:

Soulz Café & House of Soul – 549 S. Parkway East
El 7 Mares Bar & Grill – 3681 Jackson Ave.
Blue Nile Hookah & Vapor – 4205 Hacks Cross Rd., #111
Agavos Cocina & Tequila – 2924 Walnut Grove Rd.
Hadley’s Pub – 2779 Whitten Rd. (Bartlett)

The most recent health directive information can be found here.

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“Safer At Home” Lifted In New Health Directive

CREDIT: Shelby County Health Department/Facebook

Shelby County Health Department/Facebook

Shelby County Health Department director Alisa Haushalter speaks at Tuesday’s briefing.

The Shelby County Health Department formally issued a new health directive (No. 17) Wednesday afternoon and the new, looser rules will go into effect Saturday.

Health department officials said Tuesday they would issue the new directive sometime this week. Then, Health Officer Dr. Bruce Randolph outlined highlights of the directive. No material changes were made in the formal directive delivered Wednesday.

Some big changes allow restaurants to fill their dining rooms to 50 percent capacity, instead of the 25 percent allowed under the previous health directive.

Here are some the other highlights of the new rules as outlined by the health department:

• Lifts the more restrictive measures of the “Safer at Home” health directive No. 16 and returns to safety measures found in health directives 14 and 15 (includes restaurant capacity).

• Focuses on personal responsibility as the measure of how COVID-19 will ultimately impact Shelby County and surrounding communities.

• Nothing is closed per se. Certain businesses that have more interaction with the public have additional, specific safety measures as detailed in the directive.

• Organizers/businesses that want to submit a proposal for a specific event or wish to expand their operations in a manner that is not already addressed in the health directive, should submit a plan through the online portal.

• Schools are strongly encouraged to suspend all school-related close-contact sports at this time.

Read below for the new health directive in full:

[pdf-1]

 

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Organizations Brace for New Stay-At-Home Order

CREDIT: Kevin Barre Photography

Kevin Barre Photography

Brooks Museum of Art in Overton Park

Organizations in Memphis are already bracing for another stay-at-home lockdown after a new health directive was leaked late last week.

Over the weekend, leaders of the Brooks Museum of Art and the Metal Museum announced both would close until next year. Also, a protest against shutting down restaurants was announced for Monday at 1 p.m. 

“Please note that in anticipation of another Safer at Home directive from the Shelby County Health Department, the museum has also elected to close its doors to the public from December 20th through January 7th, and will reopen on Friday, January 8th,” reads a Saturday email from the Metal Museum.

Here’s a Sunday email from the Brooks:

”In anticipation of Shelby County Health Directive 16, we have made the decision to temporarily close the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, effective at 5 p.m. Saturday, December 19th, 2020 until Wednesday, January 6th, 2021 at 10 a.m. unless instructed otherwise by city and county directives,” reads the email. ”This includes all public programming.”

Meanwhile, the Memphis Restaurant Association advised its members to wait and see what may be announced Monday.

“The mayors and lawyers have been discussing our fate all day but we have yet to hear anything definitive,” reads a Sunday email from the group. “Our advice as of now is: plan to operate as we have been until we hear otherwise.”

That email also included contact information for city and county officials to “make your opinion known.”

A protest is set for Monday afternoon against further shutdowns of restaurants. The protest is set for 1 p.m. at the Shelby County government building at Downtown’s Civic Center Plaza. It is organized by Jerred Price, president of the Downtown Neighborhood Association.  Wikipedia

”The Shelby County Health Department Directive [16] is calling to shut down Memphis restaurants once again without any protection for payroll or protection for the businesses,” reads an email announcing the protest. “Restaurants are one of the largest lifelines of our city and so many people’s livelihoods. SCHD’s own data shows that spread of COVID-19 from restaurants is less than 5 percent of all cases.

“Restaurants who are following CDC guidelines set forth by the CDC shouldn’t suffer another closure, and may not make it through to see the new year if this closure is put in place.

“Let’s show up, speak up, and demand competent, thoughtful, and caring action from our leadership. Bring signs to hold up for support. #SaveOurRestaurants. No megaphones permitted.”

A draft of the health department’s new health directive was published by The Daily Memphian Friday. It included, among other things, the closure of restaurants and many other indoor businesses. The health department responded with this statement:

“At the current time, we are facing the fall surge of COVID-19 cases in Shelby County. We anticipate that the cases will continue to grow. Therefore, we are exploring all options to reduce transmission in our community.

“The document that was released to the media was a draft document for discussion amongst public health officials, health care providers and elected officials. While December 21st was identified as the effective date, it was a draft, proposed date and may change.

“Locally, we have continued to work together to explore all options that can reduce transmission while balancing economic impact. As the document is finalized, it will be released to the media via the formal, traditional channels.”

It is not yet known when or if the health department will issue a new health directive that could include the further lockdown measures.

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Bars Now Open on Health Department Order

CREDIT: Justin Fox Burks

Justin Fox Burks

High Cotton

All businesses can open here Wednesday, thanks to the latest change from the Shelby County Health Department (SCHD).

The change was announced Tuesday during the briefing from the Memphis and Shelby County COVID-19 Task Force. The move came after new daily case counts averaged below 185 for several weeks.

The change is a big win for limited service restaurants like bars, wine bars, pubs, and others that focus on sales of alcoholic beverages more than the sale of food. Those establishment have remained shuttered for weeks while full-service restaurants and others were allowed to open.

Dr. Alisa Haushalter, director of the SCHD, said bars were shut down not just because they were bars, but because of the activities that take place within them, calling the activities “high-risk behavior for (virus) transmission.” The health department did not make the decision to close bars on any specific local data, she said. She said they relied on evidence from other communities that showed bars were hotspots for transmissions.

However, the health department now has greater capacity and new data sets that can  identify an outbreak in specific bars in a more timely fashion and can “be laser focused.”

Limited service restaurants will have to adhere to the same guidelines as full-service restaurants: No seating at physical bars. Alcohol can only be served alongside food to customers sitting at tables. Service to customers can only last two hours. All establishments must close at 10 p.m. However, curbside and delivery can continue after 10 p.m.

Dancing and singing are not allowed inside at any establishment yet. However, live music is allowed at outdoor venues, but not dancing. Music must be played at a volume that still allows customers to speak at a regular volume and not yell at one another.

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SCHD Reports Six Consecutive Days with Less Than 300 New Cases Each

As of Friday, August 7th, the Shelby County Health Department (SCHD) reported 264 new COVID-19 cases. (Monday’s total new case count was 258; Tuesday’s was 207; Wednesday’s, 197; and Thursday’s, 235). That brings the county’s total number of confirmed and probable cases up to 22,816. The most recent 7-day rolling positivity rate data (from August 1st) puts the positivity rate around 16 percent. *New case counts in each SCHD graph usually lag by four to five days.

The overall positivity rate of Shelby County, however, now stands at 10.7 percent. To date, the county has performed 213,906 tests. There are currently 4,335 active COVID-19 cases, and 18,182 cases are reported as recovered.

SCHD also reported two new deaths, bringing the number of fatal cases up to 299.