(SitNews) Ketchikan, Alaska - The City of Ketchikan Fire Chief Abner Hoage held a press round table this week at firehouse one. The Local Emergency Planning Committee members were in attendance to discuss questions around the covid 19 outbreak. Members of the press emailed questions and the fire chief had different members address the questions according to their area of expertise.

The community is under a Center for Disease control "Public Health Emergency" status. It took apx 35 minutes to answer the questions before it was opened up to more questions.

Some facts, the hospital can test for the virus but the test are sent to the state lab, with a 2 day turnaround. Two people have been tested but no positive results. They are requesting that the public use caution before going to the doctor for every sniffle. This is so that the system is not overwhelmed. Please call your health provider before hand and let them direct you to come to the clinic.

Generally the local authorities are deferring any broad community wide status such as a quarantine to the state or federal officials. The hospital has 4 ICU beds with the capacity to expand to 10.

At this time the cruise lines are being aggressive about pre boarding screening by using temperature gage and pre boarding questionairs. However the biggest concern seems to be that you can be contagious without symptoms.

As it stands the local clinics will not test if you have no symptoms. Which leads to the obvious conclusion that someone can be walking around with the virus actively spreading it and not know it. The only response to this is to say that it is the physician's determination to order a test. There are no plans for comprehensive testing.

Use heightened hygene standards and don't go to school or work if you are sick.

My video of the meeting was poor quality so I tried to summarize the meeting in the video.

http://dhss.alaska.gov/dph/Epi/id/Pages/COVID-19/default.aspx

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-nCoV/

To contact Larry Jackson: ketchikanalaskanews@gmail.com

Interview Date: March 11, 2020

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