MOUNT VERNON — Centerburg will not be home to a school-based health center, but students will have access to a behavioral health counselor.
In October 2024, Knox Public Health and the Community Health Center received a $50,000 planning grant to explore locating a health center in Centerburg for behavioral health and acute care visits.
Initial plans called for the center to be in the school or accessible to the school.
“Unfortunately, we were not awarded that. But since we did about a year of planning with Centerburg Schools, we really saw the need, and the infrastructure was there, to be able to outfit a behavioral health counselor onsite at the school building,” Health Commissioner Zach Green told the county commissioners on Thursday.
The health agency will base a licensed social worker 3/drug dependency counselor 3 in the school.
Ashley Coon started Dec. 2 and will be in the school five days a week. The health department provided counseling through its Mount Vernon site while awaiting federal credentialing.
“She already had a caseload of over 15 kids at Centerburg because the families knew that she was coming,” Green said.
Green said he is concerned the caseload will reach the capacity of one counselor before the end of the year.
“But it’s a small step forward. Would I like to see a full-blown health center in all our schools? Sure, but it’s not financially sustainable,” he said. “So we’re trying to do bits and parts so we know that can work and pay dividends for the kiddos, which is huge.”
Lyme Disease outpaces 2024
The health department has recorded 187 cases of Lyme Disease thus far in 2025. That compares to 119 in 2024.
“Obviously, we’ve continued to see a substantial increase in black-legged deer tick population and infection,” Green said.
Pending legislation at the statehouse, House Bill 578, would change the Ohio Revised Code relating to tick reporting. Specifically, it would include a new category of reportable diseases.
However, Green said health agencies already have infectious disease control manuals that report such diseases.
“I appreciate where we’re trying to go with that, trying to create awareness of where we are with ticks in general. It’s going to unfortunately continue to be an issue, but having the code modified can be a major issue,” he said.
“I think the spirit of that is in the right direction; I’m just not sure changing it in the Ohio Revised Code is the most appropriate response.”
Green said the county has hot-spot areas for the black-legged deer ticks that carry Lyme Disease. Only a sustained cold snap, -10 degrees, will kill ticks.
Even with sub-zero nighttime temperatures, if daytime temperatures rise, it is not enough to kill the ticks.
Green said the increase in deer population is a variable, but noted black-legged deer ticks continue a westward migration.
Norovirus rising, influenza not yet hit
Green said the county has seen a substantial increase in the norovirus over the past couple of weeks. Norovirus is often called the stomach flu or stomach bug.
However, it is different from the flu, which is caused by the influenza virus.
“We have not seen a rise hardly at all in influenza and RSV (Respiratory Syncytial Virus), so that season has not hit us yet,” the health commissioner said.
“It is right around the corner, as we know, but norovirus in particular is skyrocketing at this point.”
The norovirus data stems from individuals who were tested. Influenza, RSV, and COVID are detected through wastewater sampling.
Norovirus is highly contagious, so it is extremely important to practice good hand hygiene.
OneOhio grants
Knox Public Health is one of four organizations that the commissioners awarded $25,000 to for opioid recovery programs.
The money comes from the county’s share of the OneOhio opioid settlement with pharmaceutical companies.
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KPH will use its grant to reduce stigma, promote healing among families affected by addiction, and prevent overdose deaths.
The Knox Health Planning Partnership also received $25,000 for a pilot biofeedback program with Dr. Brian Barkett.
“Doing this pilot project, being able to take up to 20 participants who are involved in extensive outpatient behavioral substance use disorder and doing the biofeedback with it is an outstanding idea,” Green said. “And if it truly pays dividends, being able to roll that out to any of those providers.”
Biofeedback, which involves monitoring brain waves, can help social workers who are burned out after years of dealing with the same individual, seemingly without any progress.
Initially used for PTSD when it first came out, biofeedback is now popular with veterans and first responders with EMDR therapy.
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Upcoming retirements
The department is piloting a Sensaphone cold storage monitoring system that provides real-time alerts during power outages, malfunctions, or temperature fluctuations.
Green said the department had had issues of not being notified of the potential threat of falling out of a cold storage threshold in power outages or WiFi disconnections.
Sensaphone alerts enable staff to move the cache of cold storage supplies to another location.
“Looking at back-up power supply for all these different locations, we don’t have that type of budget,” Green said. “That would be extremely expensive.”
KPH will pilot the project in Danville.
Green acknowledged the services of Dar Butts and Judy Miller, who will retire in December and February, respectively.
Both have been with the agency for 20 years.
Butts is KPH’s public service representative in Danville. Miller worked in home health through KPH and later through Knox Community Hospital after the health department transferred the home health agency to KCH.
“They are fantastic individuals and true public servants, so we want to say congratulations to them,” Green said.
