City council backs pandemic public awareness campaign

Libby Mayor Brent Teske offered City Hall’s support Aug. 17 to a group of local medical professionals hoping to recast the state’s controversial mask mandate as a way to help the community.

Led by Dr. Gregory Rice of the Libby Clinic, the group petitioned city councilors to aid them in encouraging residents to wear masks, stay home if feeling unwell and self-isolate when diagnosed with COVID-19 or exhibiting symptoms related to the illness. A public awareness campaign is forthcoming, Rice said.

“I just want you to look into your hearts and really ask: How can the council help promote a fun campaign in this town?” Rice said.

While conceding that many residents rely on Facebook for information, Teske offered possible alternatives. Those included letting the group post flyers on the bulletin boards at City Hall, leave literature at the building’s counters and, if possible, spread word via the city’s website.

“It seems like everybody is a Facebooker,” he said. “We’ll do anything we can here at City Hall to help promote or push out information.”

Local health workers first pitched the idea of a public awareness campaign to the Lincoln County Board of Commissioners several weeks ago. Rice, flanked by representatives from local medical facilities, implored the commissioners to take more seriously the threat posed by the novel coronavirus.

Rice and his colleagues took a similar approach before city councilors in Libby, describing the potential danger of letting the coronavirus spread unchecked through Lincoln County. He pointed to the surge in cases in late June and July after the county had gone several months without a new COVID-19 patient as evidence of how quickly the virus moves.

Four of the individuals who contracted the infection in recent weeks were patients at Libby Clinic, Rice said. One eventually succumbed to the disease, he said.

Lincoln County has seen two deaths related to COVID-19 since the pandemic began.

“It’s obviously painful,” Rice said. “It’s kind of like drowning over several days.”

And local health providers are at risk as well. Dr. Kelli Jarrett joined Rice in warning city councilors that the region’s medical system could easily be overrun if just a few health workers became ill or had to quarantine.

Rachel Toland, administrator at the Libby Care Center, warned that an exposure in her facility could lead to a major outbreak in just a few days. It would knock the facility out of commission for upwards of six weeks, she said.

“Our sister facility in Kellogg had its first case [Aug. 7] and within three days half of the residents were affected and a third of the staff,” she said.

Encouraging the public to adopt and practice preventative measures is the best way to avert such a scenario, the health workers told city councilors. To do that, they want to recast the oft-acrimonious debate surrounding measures like face coverings and quarantines in a more positive light. Instead of enforcement, the conversation ought to focus on how best to help your neighbors, Jarrett said.

“We wear masks to protect our community. I wear my mask to protect you. You wear your mask to protect me,” she said. “It’s not about being punitive, but taking care of each other.”

Rice said he also hopes to put a positive spin on social distancing.

“The enemy is the virus,” he said. “It’s not people who wear masks; it’s not people who don’t wear masks. We just need to focus on the positive.”

And officials need to impress upon residents the importance of staying home if unwell — particularly if they are a close contact of an individual infected with the coronavirus or have tested positive for the virus, he said. At least a few patients knowingly infected with the virus have ventured out into the community, Rice said.

City Councilor Kristin Smith thanked the health workers for their initiative. She thought the community spirit approach might prove persuasive among residents.

“If the message is you have to step up for your community because if one goes down it affects that many more people, in my mind that’s kind of the approach we want,” she said. “One for all and all for one — that kind of an attitude.”

Smith also touched upon a growing perception in the community that medical experts were more concerned with the virus than the economic damage caused by the pandemic. As a business owner, Smith said she imposed a face covering initiative before the governor issued his mask mandate for counties with more than four active cases.

“A vibrant economy depends on healthy customers,” she said.