Plea to Local Businesses

The Pulaski County COVID-19 Task Force is asking local businesses to please close for two weeks to maximize the effectiveness of the strongest weapon in the war on COVID-19. As a sparsely populated rural community, the best weapon in the fight against this devastating disease is minimizing its introduction and limiting its spread.

The local task force reports the public must do everything possible to “flatten the curve” of the coronavirus pandemic by:

• Suspending operations at businesses/plants for the next two weeks
• Insist employees and their families to self-quarantine for 14 days
• Insist employees and their families practice “real social distancing” for those 14 days
• Protect the county’s limited resources and doctors, nurses and all medical professionals

Still not convinced of the need?

The task force asks to please consider the following:

• “Our access to Personal Protective Equipment and medical equipment is limited”
• “Federal resources like medical supplies and protective equipment will be distributed based upon population, and we know we will receive a very-limited amount of those much-needed supplies. Even though we are willing and able to purchase supplies, their availability is still based upon population. Our doctors, nurses, patient caregivers at our area hospital and nursing homes are relying on area businesses to help keep them safe and available on the frontline so they can keep us healthy and safe during the coronavirus pandemic.”

Rural Communities Are at High Risk

This link shows the most recent national epidemiologist modeling of the predicted effects of the Coronavirus Pandemic.

Indiana’s epidemiologist modeling is consistent with the national modeling. The experts predict that this devastating pandemic will be even more devastating in rural areas than it is in urban areas.

The local community may have limited access to federal resources based on population, but being a rural community with a sparse population has its advantages if we all practice social distancing and do our part to flatten the curve.

Protect Your Business and Prevent Lawsuits

Many companies have attorneys that can find loopholes to make their business essential under Indiana’s Stay-At-Home Order. While those attorneys work hard to find loopholes, other attorneys are working hard to prepare for “wrongful death” suits against those companies that did not follow the CDC (Center for Disease Control) and ISDH (Indiana State Department of Health) guidelines to protect their employees.

For those companies that really can’t shut down because they provide essential needs to area residents like Sanders, CVS, etc., the task force urges them to require the maximum protection for employees and customers, including but not limited to:

• Screening and monitoring employees upon entering work
• Social distancing of employees and customers
• 14-day self-quarantine for anyone with potential exposure

How Pulaski County Health Officials Can Support You During This Time

The Pulaski County Health Department and Pulaski Memorial Hospital are available to residents to share strategies that may assist with individual needs and have been aggressively creating and implementing strategies of their own to prepare for this crisis. Screening for symptoms such as fever, sore throat, cough, headache, body aches in the past 24 hours are felt to be a minimum, and a simple questionnaire could accomplish this, although taking temperatures as well would be ideal. This can be accomplished by a variety of easily trained personnel, not just nurses. Again, the goal is to identify infected workers prior to symptoms developing or as early in their clinical course as possible.

The task force is sending a respectful plea to the public to understand the absolute necessity to implement CDC and ISDH guidelines to protect employees, their families and the community. We believe these efforts to be the area’s only hope to aggressively stifle the spread of coronavirus.

This urgent plea was issued by the Pulaski County COVID-19 task force who thanked the community “for your support in this battle against the Coronavirus Pandemic." It was signed by PMH medical staff president Dan Anderson, M.D., Pulaski County Health Department health officer Rex Allman, M.D., and Pulaski Memorial Hospital president and CEO Tom Barry.