As parents and grandparents scramble to find solutions to Monday’s mandated closure of all K-12 schools in Michigan, and search for daycare, pre-school and other similar programs, the Berrien County Healthy Department is responding with news that those programs are not under the same mandate from the Governor as K-12 systems.
The Berrien County Health Department says last night’s dispatch from the Governor, the state-wide closure of K-12 systems, does not impact pre-schools, daycares, or Head Start programs at this time, however, these organizations and programs are able to make individualized closure decisions as needed.
Nicki Britten is Health Officer for Berrien County. She says, “We understand that this state-wide K-12 school closure decision raises a lot of questions for families in our community,” and adds, “This social distancing measure may seem extreme, particularly before the virus is spreading in Berrien County, but these actions will help mitigate the spread of the virus throughout the state, and result in slowed progression of illness and fewer deaths overall. We all need to do our part to protect the members of our community who are most at risk of serious illness. I urge all residents to continue taking preventive actions to help keep themselves and their families healthy.”
To date, Berrien County has not reported any cases of COVID-19, but with recently increased testing and cases reported in neighboring areas, it is expected that community transmission of the virus will occur.
All Berrien County residents are encouraged to take every day, common sense precautions to avoid getting sick and protect others:
- Implement personal protective measures (stay home when sick, regular handwashing, cover coughs/sneezes, and clean frequently touched surfaces daily).
- Stop hand-shaking – use other non-contact methods for greeting one another (like an elbow bump).
- Create a household plan of action in case of illness in the household or further disruption of daily activities due to COVID-19 in the community.
- Individuals at increased risk of severe illness should consider staying at home and avoiding large gatherings or other situations of potential exposures, including travel.
- Consider canceling non-essential travel as crowded travel settings, like airports, may increase your risk of exposure to COVID-19.
The Berrien County Health Department staff members are working day and night to monitor this evolving situation and will continue to provide new information to the community as things change. A hotline has been established to answer questions from the public at 1-800-815-5485 and more information can be found at the Berrien County Health Department website at www.bchdmi.org or by following BCHD on social media.
*****UPDATE*****
Tri-County Head Start has elected to cease operations until April 13th including home visiting programs because many of their classrooms reside in public schools, their independent sites are more than 100 participants, receive food from public schools or have staff who are impacted by the public school closures.
Teachers and home visitors will contact parents to deliver 4-weeks worth of home kits next week on Monday or Tuesday, and will check in at least once a week to check progress.
