A Word About Masks and Gloves

A mask protects other people from you. A respirator protects you from other people. Let’s save the respirators for the people who risk their lives to keep us alive. For more information see 3M. Photo source: 3M

This post originally appeared and on the Hearts, Homes, and Hands blog on 2020-03-30.

Breath I’ll take and breath I’ll give

Pray the day ain’t poison

Stand among the ones that live

In lonely indecision.

—Townes vanZandt

You’ve probably heard we face a shortage of masks and gloves, needed supplies to help fight the spread of the Coronavirus or COVID-19 (C-19). The best we can do as individuals is to make sure we are using these supplies correctly.

Masks

Let’s start with masks. Wearing a mask won’t keep you from getting sick, but it can keep you from spreading the disease if you are already sick.

The understanding as I write this post is that C-19 is transmitted through heavy droplets when you cough or sneeze. A mask can keep you from spreading these droplets. But because they tend to fall to the ground—they don’t stay suspended in the air—you don’t have to worry too much about inhaling them unless you are around someone who has the disease for more than 15 minutes.

You can get sick if you touch something that these droplets have fallen on and then touch your face. So that brings us to gloves.

Gloves

It doesn’t do you any good to wear gloves if you don’t take them off correctly. Here’s the right way in pictures. Photo by Room’s Studio

Gloves cut both ways. They can protect you from some forms of direct contact, but they can also encourage a false sense of security that reduces hand washing. Your gloves can also contact the infected droplets. If you touch your face while still wearing the gloves, you might as well not be wearing the gloves at all.

Then there’s the types of gloves. I saw someone walking their pet while wearing winter gloves. Cloth gloves can trap more of the infected droplets near your skin so you take them home with you. If you don’t immediately throw cloth gloves in the washer, you probably shouldn’t wear them at all.

Finally, there is an art to taking your gloves off. Be careful not to touch the outside of the glove to your skin. And wash your hands immediately, just in case.

These are scary times, but we can get through them if we think about what we’re doing, take care of each other, and work together.

Say “Yes” to the Move

Marilyn renovated an historic house to open the Central Avenue Bistro. Renovating the old hospital for the county government makes just as much sense. Photo by Steve Young

We all support the renovation and move. Photo by Steve Young

No medical provider is interested in using the old hospital. In fact, given its legal history, it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to get the campus relicensed as a hospital. Redeveloping the buildings for the county government is the best use of this property.

This post originally appeared on the Hermit Haus Redevelopment blog on 2020-03-20.

You’re gonna ease my mind, put me there on time

And keep rollin’ on

— Hank Snow

The other day, a group of business leaders and government officials gathered at the Central Avenue Bistro to support Judge Steve Young’s project to move the county government out of several buildings in downtown Cameron and into the old hospital after it’s renovated.

This move will be good for Cameron and Milam County for a number of reasons.

It saves the old hospital, giving it new life. Since there are currently no other redevelopment plans for the old hospital in place, the banks that own the property were going to tear it down. There are no other plans on the table. The county can renovate and move into the facility, or the banks will tear it down. I tried to find investors to repurpose the building for other purposes. Nobody was interested.

Renovating the old hospital gives the county a fresh new set of offices at a fraction of the price of new construction. It also gives us the opportunity to redevelop the downtown buildings the county currently occupies. Finding investors and capital to redevelop individual buildings is much easier than finding investors who are willing to watch millions of dollars sit idly for at least a year or two—or more—while we redevelop and repurpose the old hospital for other use. The risk to each investor is lower because the individual projects are more manageable, both financially and logistically.

Finally, getting the county out of downtown gives the city the opportunity to plan how to redevelop the area. We’ve all seen the results of unplanned growth. It’s usually ugly and often unsustainable. The county’s dominance of downtown real estate has actually stifled Cameron’s development. By removing that impediment and enabling the city to decide how we want Cameron to grow, we can gently nudge investment in the way that provides the most benefit to the community.

I urge everyone to support Judge Young in moving Milam County and Cameron forward with this project. It will be good for everyone.

See, I was there with my Moving Milam Forward pin on my hat, even if I didn’t get the plaid memo. Photo by Steve Young

To that point, I want to address a misconception I have heard raised to this project. Some people in other parts of the county have asked why they should pay to improve Cameron. Although tax money will be used to renovate the old hospital for the county’s use and Cameron will benefit from that renovation, so will all parts of the county. From the numbers I’ve seen, the hospital renovation is much less expensive that the cost of bringing all the buildings the county currently occupies into compliance with state codes. Part of that saving arises from the fact that it is always less expensive to renovate an empty building than an occupied one.

And the funds to renovate the buildings downtown will come from individual investors, not from tax funds. That means county money is only going to county use, just as it would if the county offices stayed where they are. We are just spending less money for better, healthier facilities. Please say yes to helping Judge Young move Milam County forward.

Life Is Better with Clean Hands

This graphic provides a more detailed handwashing procedure. Infographic by Shutterstock

The CDC is rolling out a new program: “Life is Better with Clean Hands.” Photo source CDC

This post originally appeared on the Hearts, Homes, and Hands blog on 2020-03-14.

We have all been washing our hands for a long time, but we may not have always washed them effectively. I’ve seen guys barely splash water on their hands, wipe their hands lightly on their shirt, and grab the door handle. That may actually be worse than not washing your hands at all because the damp hands may help germs grow and definitely helps them spread.

So, I wanted to see what the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) recommends. It turns out CDC has specific guidance for both how and when we should wash up.

Proper Hand Washing

The CDC recommends five simple steps to wash your hands:

1. Wet your hands under clean, running water. It can be warm or cold. For me, the hotter it is, the better. 
2. Apply soap and lather. Get all of your hands—between the fingers, under the nails, the backs of your hands, around your thumbs, and all around your wrists. 
3. Scrub thoroughly. The CDC suggests humming “Happy Birthday” twice to make sure you scrub for at least 20 seconds. 
4. Rinse your hands well, again with clean, running water. 
5. Dry your hands completely with a clean towel or air dryer.

What About Sanitizers?

If you don’t have access to clean, running water, soap, and towels, hand sanitizers are better than nothing, but they are not as effective as simply cleaning your hands. Sanitizers don’t kill all kinds of germs. They are much less effective when your hands are really dirty or greasy, and they don’t remove harmful chemicals that can get on your hands as part of daily life.

When to Wash

We all know you should wash up before you start preparing food. But the CDC also recommends washing up several times while you’re cooking, like after touching raw meat or when changing the types of food you’re working with.

You should also wash up:

• After using the bathroom (and before if you’re a mechanic) 
• Before meals 
• After caring for someone who is sick 
• Before and after treating a cut, wound, or burn 
• After blowing your nose, sneezing, or coughing 
• After touching an animal, its food, or its waste 
• After touching garbage

Changing Hands and Habits

Of course, none of this matters if you still hold the menu in both hands. Photo by Suna

This post originally appeared on the Hearts, Homes, and Hands blog on 2020-03-10.

Dance, dance the shaking of the sheets

Dance, dance when you hear the piper

Playing, everyone must dance

The shaking of the sheets with me

— Traditional

As our President proved by touching his face almost immediately after claiming he hadn’t done so in months, not touching your face is almost impossible. But since that is one of the main ways we get several viruses, the CDC recommends we don’t do it.

I tried to not touch my face. I couldn’t do it. As one comedian put it, “How else do you know it’s still there?”

So, I’m working on a new habit to help protect myself from viruses like COVID-19. I try to open doors, shake hands, and similar tasks only with my right hand. I try to use only my left hand to wipe my eyes, scratch my nose, or clean my beard. Since our culture always shakes right hands, no matter which is your dominant hand, I suggest using this division of labor even if you are left-handed.

A habit is a set of behaviors we do so often we don’t have to think about them. It consists of a stimulus, a response, and a reward. In the case of an itchy nose, the itch is the stimulus, the response is to scratch, and the reward is relief. To change this habit, we just have to narrow the response to using our left hand to scratch and reinforce the reward by telling ourselves that we’ve done well when we make the switch.

It takes time to change habits. I’ll be working on this change for a while.

Let’s All Stay Healthy

Washing your hands in warm, soapy water is the single most effective thing you can do to stay healthier. Photo source: Shutterstock

This post originally appeared on the Hearts, Homes, and Hands blog on 2020-03-03.

Don’t let us get sick

Don’t let us get old

Don’t let us get stupid, all right?

—Warren Zevon

On Monday, 24 February, the CDC made a startling if not unexpected announcement. The global efforts to contain the N. Corona Virus - now officially called COVID-19 (C-19) are doomed to failure. So are the CDC’s efforts to keep C-19 out of the U.S. It is not a question of if C-19 will spread, “it’s more a question of when this will happen and a question of how many people will have severe illness.”

In October 2019, Johns Hopkins gamed out a global pandemic. Ironically, they chose a corona virus, not C-19 since this was a simulation and C-19 had not even been identified yet. Unfortunately, it showed 77% of countries were not able to collect real-time data on the spread of the disease, which means the reported number of cases is probably much lower than the number of actual cases. The good news is that the US ranked the most prepared. Not well prepared but better than anyone else.

C-19 is in the same family of viruses as the common cold. So, we already have some pretty effective ways of dealing with it. 

Older people, the very young, and those with immune systems compromised by other factors are the most at risk. But as with cold and flu, you might get C-19 and your symptoms could be so mild you don’t even know you’re sick.

Photo source: Amazon

Don’t Panic

While C-19 spreads around the world and could play havoc with the global economy, it is not a monster virus like the one in Stephen King’s epic The Stand. Its more lethal than a typical flu outbreak, but it does not seem to spread as easily. In fact, given recent cases of “community spread,” many otherwise healthy people may not even know they have contracted C-19. Many others may think they have the flu and either wait it out or ignore it.

• The leaders in our community already have plans. Robert Kirkpatrick, the Milam County Director of Public Health Preparedness is already working with state health officials and the CDC to monitor and coordinate efforts.
• Suna covered what our Health Department is doing in the Hearts, Homes, and Hands blog post of 20 February. School officials in Milam County and around the country are developing plans to deal with students testing positive for C-19.
• I have a long-standing policy of sending sick people home. Both Hearts, Homes, and Hands and Hermits’ Rest Enterprises follow this policy. We don’t want people having to make the choice of going to work sick or putting food on the table. We all know where that decision will fall. 

You don’t have to go to this extreme to protect yourself from getting sick. Besides, the guy’s beard total breaks the respirator seal. Photo by Monkey Business Images
Shutterstock

What Should We Do?

While we shouldn’t panic, we need to approach this disease with open eyes. It might be comforting to hear that C-19 will be controlled by warmer weather in the Spring, as is the case with the flu and other corona viruses, but we don’t know that for sure. People still get colds and the flu in the summer, just not so frequently.

Here are a few things you can do to stay healthier:

• Avoid contact with sick people. Most of us can’t isolate ourselves and avoid any potential contact with potentially infected individuals, much as we might wish to. But we can try to avoid people who are obviously sick
• Wash your hands with soap and warm water for 25 seconds at least twice a day and always before eating. The CDC says this is the most effective thing you can do to avoid getting sick from just about any cause. 
• Avoid touching your mouth, nose, and eyes. These viruses spread thrive in the fluids produced in your mouth, nose, and eyes. They have evolved to irritate these parts of your body, making them water and facilitating virus transmission. 
• If you run a business, have a plan to limit the spread C-19 (or the flu) through your workforce. Can your employees work from home? Will you pay them? Where will you get replacement workers?