Lewis County Health Officer Dr. Rachel Wood speaks at the Board of Health meeting in August in the commissioners' hearing room.
Lewis County Commissioner Gary Stamper at the Board of Health meeting on Monday afternoon.
Lewis County Public Health & Social Services Deputy Director John Abplanalp gives the County Commissioners an update regarding COVID-19 during Monday’s Board of Health meeting.
Lewis County Health Officer Dr. Rachel Wood speaks at the Board of Health meeting last month in the commissioners' hearing room.
Lewis County Commissioner Edna Fund at the Board of Health meeting on Monday afternoon.
The COVID-19 pandemic is affecting more than just our physical health, Matt Patten, chief of operations at Cascade Mental Health Care said to the Board of County Commissioners at the monthly Board of Health meeting on Monday afternoon.
“There are many folks out there who believe that COVID may have some of the same type of impact on our community that trauma has and as a result of that we are expecting an increase in mental health issues related to post-traumatic stress disorder and depression,” he said. “We’re certainly seeing an increase in anxiety and depressive disorders already nationwide in terms of response to COVID.”
He said that while there hasn’t been a significant increase in the number of local calls coming into the Cascade Mental Health Care’s crisis line, the organization is noticing an increase in calls related to suicidal individuals.
“That’s certainly a significant concern. One of the best ways to manage folks who are suicidal is to get them a support network developed and get them to spend time with people who can help them. Obviously now we are limited in our ability to do that during a time like this. That’s one of the side effects of the consequences of this virus,” Patten said.
Commissioner Gary Stamper asked if Lewis County Public Health and Social Services and the Sheriff’s Department could compile county-wide data regarding suicide rates and domestic and child abuse cases to put it all into one report.
“We’ve heard about the domestic and child abuse and some of those things. We know that a lot of them are not being reported because there’s no school and there’s a lot of isolation. I would like to see the full picture,” said Stamper.
Commissioner Edna Fund pointed out that the only telling data regarding the mental health of Lewis County citizens is the number of deaths by suicide reported by the Lewis County Coroner’s Office.
“We did get some data from the coroner’s office and that shows who’s been ‘successful’ that doesn’t tell us about others who are in that deep, deep depression that leads to those kinds of considerations,” said Fund.
Commissioner Bobby Jackson noted that in July of 2020, Lewis County has had 12 suicides, up from five in the same time period in 2019 and three in 2018, according to the coroner’s office.
“The numbers are up considerably in all of these categories… I think we all understand that COVID and the current situation is probably leading to a lot of this,” said Jackson.
Lewis County Undersheriff Wes Rethwill gave the county commissioners some of the data collected by the sheriff’s office regarding various types of crimes and if they have increased since the COVID-19 outbreak.
The numbers Rethwill gave were taken from March through July 31 of this year and compared to the same timeframe in 2019. The numbers were higher in each category.
Calls for service increased from 6,686 to 7,012, family disputes rose from 150 to 165 and severe assault cases are up from 77 to 93.
“One of our biggest jumps has been in our death investigations. It jumped from 38 to 64 in the same time frame. Many of those are potentially suicides. We do not track suicide separately. That is something that the coroner’s office does,” Rethwill said.
He said that burglaries and theft have remained pretty much the same in the March to July 31 timeframe in 2019 and 2020. However, the number of fraud calls related to employment security increased by over 100.
“One of the most notable increases that we can say is directly related to the overall COVID situation is in the number of fraud calls that we have been receiving over this March to July 31 timeframe. We received about 151 fraud calls as compared to under 10 in the same timeframe last year,” Rethwill said.
Rethwill specified that the numbers he reported are specific to the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office and local police departments will have their own numbers.
“It’s very difficult for us to say that the increase in the number of family disputes or assaults or calls for service are directly related to COVID. My guess is there is some correlation to that but it’s too difficult to say COVID is the reason why all of these things are up,” said Rethwill.
