Area Health Departments Issue Health Alert and Call to Action; Senior Center Closed Indefinitely

The South Milwaukee and St. Francis Health Department has joined with others across the region to issue a “health alert and call to action” due to “critically high levels of COVID-19 and significant spread in our communities.”

You can read the full press release here. From it …

The health departments across southeast Wisconsin urgently state that we have reached a critical level of the pandemic.

Southeastern Wisconsin is currently experiencing critically high levels of COVID-19 and significant spread in our communities. Your help is necessary to reduce the spread and to protect our families, our friends, and our community.

All residents who live and work in southeastern Wisconsin must continue to take personal responsibility to protect ourselves and our loved ones.

Even though not all who test positive for COVID-19 experience a severe case of the virus, we all risk getting the virus and spreading it to others – maybe without realizing we’re sick.

Taking extra precautions now will allow our schools to stay open, our businesses to remain operational, and it helps us all to protect our most vulnerable relatives and neighbors from the effects of COVID-19.

South Milwaukee has seen a surge in cases in recent weeks — 70 new cases alone from last Friday through Wednesday. That has stressed our contract tracing system.

From the release …

Given this surge, local health department efforts to control the spread of the virus have become increasingly strained. Demand has exceeded local public health capacity to effectively identify cases and conduct case investigation and contact tracing. In response to the surge in COVID-19 positive cases, local health departments will be prioritizing disease notification and investigation over contact notification. While we will continue to do our best to notify and investigate everyone with a positive result and to inform those who may have been exposed to a positive individual, additional prioritization is needed due to the volume of new positive cases. Additionally, the lack of notification, disease investigation and contact tracing capacity may result in delayed notification and fewer attempted follow-ups by the health department.

The City of South Milwaukee is also closing the Grobschmidt Senior Center to in-person programming. Drive-through lunch service will continue.

More details here.