Orange County Health Department

Emergency Preparedness and Response:
December 23, 2020

There will be no weekday COVID-19 testing events on December 24, 25, 2020 and January 1, 2021

There will be no weekday COVID-19 Testing Events on December 24, 25, 2020 and January 1st, 2021.
 
For the most up-to-date information on testing please visit: orangecountync.gov/testing. 

 

Daily testing will continue Monday through Saturday from 9 am to 6 pm in Chapel Hill (except 12/24, 12/25 and 1/1):
R7 Parking Lot, 725 MLK Jr. Blvd. Chapel Hill, NC 27514. Pre-registration is encouraged: https://lhi.care/covidtesting. 

    • English: https://www.orangecountync.gov/DocumentCenter/View/13709/Optum_Covid19Flyer_R7_WeekdayTesting_ENG. 
    • Spanish: https://www.orangecountync.gov/DocumentCenter/View/13710/Optum_Covid19Flyer_R7_WeekdayTesting_SPA.   
    • *Daily testing in Chapel Hill was cancelled due to rain on Monday, December 14th. The daily testing in Hillsborough remained open. 
Daily testing will continue Monday through Friday from 9 am to 5 pm in Hillsborough (except 12/24, 12/25 and 1/1):
Whitted Human Services, 300 W. Tryon St. Hillsborough, NC 27278. Pre-registration is encouraged: https://unityphm.com/campaigns/starmed. 
    • English: https://www.orangecountync.gov/DocumentCenter/View/13350/SM_Covid19Flyer_OrangeCountyHD_WeekdayTesting_ENGLISH. 
    • Spanish: https://www.orangecountync.gov/DocumentCenter/View/13351/SM_Covid19Flyer_OrangeCountyHD_WeekdayTesting_SPANISH.
 
*****Other testing events*****
  
Saturday, December 26 from 10 am to 2 pm at St. Thomas More Catholic Church at
  • English: https://www.orangecountync.gov/DocumentCenter/View/13903/Covid19Flyer_st_thomas_more_12_26_ENGLISH?bidId=
  • Spanish: https://www.orangecountync.gov/DocumentCenter/View/13904/Covid19Flyer_st_thomas_more_12_26_SPANISH?bidId=

For the most up-to-date information on testing please visit: orangecountync.gov/testing. 
 

There will be no weekday COVID-19 Testing Events on December 24, 25, 2020 and January 1st, 2021.
 
You may find other Orange County testing sites, not associated with the Orange County Health Department, at this link:
https://www.orangecountync.gov/DocumentCenter/View/11576/Coronavirus-Testing-Chart-PDF
 
For other testing location in North Carolina, use this link: 
https://covid19.ncdhhs.gov/about-covid-19/testing/find-my-testing-place



Orange County Health Department COVID-19 Vaccine Plan



Quintana Stewart's headshot
Orange County Health Director Quintana Stewart

Listen to the Orange County Health Director, Quintana Stewart, as she speaks with WCHL's Aaron Keck on the vaccination plan:


https://chapelboro.com/the-aaron-keck-show/on-air-today/december-17-2020-vaccines-and-the-three-ws


Watch a question and answer session with Quintana Stewart, recorded December 21 with Orange County Government staff:

https://youtu.be/lX3quLY5iZs

Learn more about the vaccination plan in Orange County:

www.orangecountync.gov/getyourshot

Video of Dr. Kizzmekia Corbett

Orange County Native Dr. Kizzmekia Corbett is Praised as Key Scientist Behind COVID-19 Vaccine


Thank you Dr. Corbett for helping us to take this big step to end the pandemic!


COVID-19 Vaccine FAQ:

If I have food or medication allergies, can I still get the COVID-19 vaccine?

CDC says: 

If you have ever had a severe allergic reaction to any ingredient in a COVID-19 vaccine, CDC recommends that you should not get that specific vaccine. If you have had a severe allergic reaction to other vaccines or injectable therapies, you should ask your doctor if you should get a COVID-19 vaccine. Your doctor will help you decide if it is safe for you to get vaccinated.

CDC recommends that people with a history of severe allergic reactions not related to vaccines or injectable medications—such as allergies to food, pet, venom, environmental, or latex—may still get vaccinated. People with a history of allergies to oral medications or a family history of severe allergic reactions, or who might have an milder allergy to vaccines (no anaphylaxis)—may also still get vaccinated.

If you have a severe allergic reaction after getting the first shot, you should not get the second shot. Your doctor may refer you to a specialist in allergies and immunology to provide more care or advice.


How to gather safely in a pandemic.


How to Gather Safely in a Pandemic
English: https://youtu.be/KpbxXvZcKYQ
Spanish: https://youtu.be/MSz1sq3u_0g

  • Avoid holiday travel and gatherings with those you don’t live with
  • If you must travel or gather: Get tested ahead of time, wear a mask all the time, and keep it small and outdoors
  • One-page flyer & detailed guidance (English & Spanish) available at https://covid19.ncdhhs.gov/information/individuals-families-and-communities/guidelines-get-togethers#winter-holidays 



COVID-19 Vaccinations: Those most at risk get it first.
  • A tested, safe and effective vaccine will be available to all who want it, but supplies will be limited at first.
  • The best way to fight COVID-19 is to start first with vaccinations for those most at risk, then reach more people as the vaccine supply increases throughout 2021.

More information at http://orangecountync.gov/2617/Vaccine


A Family’s Quarantine-Kitchen Bonding in
“Have You Eaten”

By Han Zhang
Film by Lina Li
December 18, 2020

While making dumplings together, the filmmaker and her mother reflect on how their relationship has changed.

In the first few months of quarantine, Lina Li was especially well fed. In mid-March, Li, a junior at Ryerson University, in Toronto, decamped from her apartment downtown and moved back to her parents’ house in the suburban town of Thornhill, about half an hour’s drive from the city. Li’s mother, Yan Gao, was prepared for the lockdown—in January, after learning about the spread of the coronavirus in China, she stocked her pantry with staples: for starters, four bottles of soy sauce and ten bags of jasmine rice; a restaurateur friend supplied brisket, for the freezer. The only thing Gao didn’t stock up on was vegetables—she doesn’t believe in frozen greens. She grows zucchini, cucumbers, green onions, chives, and tomatoes in her garden.

The pandemic brought Gao’s two adult daughters and her husband—who, for decades, had split his time between Beijing and Toronto for business—under one roof.

The family played board games, watched movies, and took daily walks together—that is, between gulping down the elaborate meals that Gao whipped up.

After starting college, Li came to appreciate the time that her family spent around the dining table, when she and her mother could talk about how they sometimes misunderstood each other. “Generational barriers, cultural barriers, and language barriers,” Li told me over the phone on Sunday, “that’s something that’s always between us. In day-to-day conversations, we were not on the same page.” Li was born in China. Her father, who longed for better opportunities and wanted to see the world, moved to Canada in 1991. After a decade of working a string of odd jobs—washing dishes, babysitting, massaging—he started his own business in medical-uniform manufacturing, then brought his wife and two daughters, who were three and five, to Toronto. Gao’s English was limited, and as a child Li sometimes had to accompany her to help translate on errands. Li envied her classmates, whose parents could chat with their friends and understood how summer camp worked.

In her short documentary “Have You Eaten,” Li and Gao talk about their relationship while preparing dumplings, a northern Chinese favorite. The film highlights the sensory details of the process, and their conversation and rapport reflect the way that their relationship has transformed over the years.

As Li became independent, she started to see her mother in a new light, appreciating the tenacity that it must have taken to uproot her life to start anew in a foreign land. “As we grew older, both sides came to accept the differences,” Li said. Still, what is a mother-daughter relationship without some fuss over life’s smallest details, to be forgotten three minutes later? The pair, who talk sweetly in the film, had bickered that very morning, Li told me—her mother had been eager to get going with her to-do list, but Li wanted her to just sit still and chat for a bit.

In late September, Li moved back to Toronto. Looking back at the six months that she spent at her parents’ house, Li sometimes thinks about the times they made dumplings together: her mother making the filling, her father kneading the dough and forming it into dumpling skin with a rolling pin, she and her sister joining the assembly line to wrap the filling into crescent packets. She is not that skilled, Li confessed, but she loves the steamy homeyness of the affair, and its connection to childhood memories. But she also remembers sometimes feeling, during those months of family quarantine, like a caged, wing-clipped bird. I couldn’t help asking a wicked question: Who was your capturer, covid-19 or your parents? She demurred. “We were just appreciative that we were alive and healthy,” she said, and eating well.

Put a freeze on winter holiday fires




North Carolina COVID-19 Cases


The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) reports 488,902 COVID-19 cases, 6,291 deaths, and 3,001 hospitalizations, as of December 22, 2020. For more information regarding live updates (NCDHHS updates the site every day around noon), please visit the NCDHHS website. 

Orange County Health Department also has a COVID-19 dashboard webpage, with information on COVID-19 data in the county. The dashboard will be updated every Tuesday and Thursday.

There are currently 4,703 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Orange County, and 63 deaths.




COVID-19 Community Resources

For more information on COVID-19 community resources in the county, please visit our webpage. Resources on specific topic areas, such as food access, education, housing, and others, are all accessible on our website, or at the links below.
Stay at Home
Community Resources
Multilingual Resources
Face Coverings
Social Distancing
COVID-19 FAQ
Testing
Symptoms
Myths and Facts
How to Help
Long Term Facilities
Equity
Places of Worship
Pets
OCHD Spanish Webpage




Contact Information


For general questions (not urgent) about 2019 Novel Coronavirus, contact NCDHHS at: ncresponse@dhhs.nc.gov or 1-866-462-3821 to address general questions about coronavirus from the public.

If you are an individual or a medical practice with questions about COVID-19, call the Orange County Health Department at (919) 245-6111. During business hours (8:30a.m. to 5 p.m.) 

Contact Kristin Prelipp, the Orange County Health Department’s Public Information Officer at: kprelipp@orangecountync.gov or 919-245-2462

Orange County Health Department:
Web: www.orangecountync.gov/coronavirus
Phone: 919-245-2400
Email: covid19@orangecountync.gov
Facebook: Orange County Health Department
Instagram: OrangeHealthNC
Twitter: Orange Health NC
Youtube: OCHDNC

Share on Facebook
Share on Twitter
Share via Email

Copyright 2020 Orange County (N.C.) Government. All Rights Reserved.
300 W Tryon St, Hillsborough, NC 27278

Powered by
CivicSend - A product of CivicPlus