|
Printer Friendly Version
1940’s
Harris County
Population
1940: 528,961
In the early 1940’s,a sanitarian working under the direction of a
part-time public health physician initiated the
services that have grown and developed into the
agency that today is known as Harris County Public
Health & Environmental Services (HCPHES). During
these early years, the primary task of the
sanitarian was to post quarantine notices. As time
permitted, the sanitarian responded to complaints
about unsanitary conditions in the County.
In response to public
health issues, Harris County Commissioners Court
formed an alliance with the Texas State Health
Department in 1942 to organize a Harris County
Health Unit. This state/county partnership allowed
for expanded services in environmental health and
preventive health nursing. Expertise in these
specialized areas was now more available to the
growing population of Harris County.
By 1947, the Harris County
Heath Unit had a staff of ten including a sanitation
division consisting of four sanitarians and a chief
sanitarian. The Sanitation Division was responsible
for posting quarantine notices on dwellings where
residents were identified as having a communicable
disease. Sanitarians also inspected summer camps,
restaurants, schools, water supplies, and sewage
treatment plants. Despite efforts by the early
inspectors, unsanitary conditions continued to exist
as many farmers butchered livestock under the trees
in the hot sun and sewage drained into open ditches.
Another emerging health
concern was rabies. By the late 1940’s, Rabies
Control became part of the Sanitation Division.
The other area of the
Harris County Health Unit was Preventive Health
Nursing. A total of three nurses provided services
in the county relating to quarantine, school
immunizations, school nursing, tuberculosis skin
testing, and screening for head lice and nits.
Additional responsibilities included conducting
blood tests on all inmates of county institutions,
responding to outbreaks of impetigo, scabies, and
granulated eyelids from rice gnats.
1950’s
Harris County
Population
1950: 806,701
During the 1950’s,
several public health sections were added to the
Harris County Health Unit. The Vector Control
Section was charged with eradicating two common
mosquito-borne diseases of the era, malaria and St.
Louis encephalitis (SLE). The Animal Control
Section was created to combat the increasing
incidence of rabies in the county. In 1953, Harris
County earned the title of “Rabies Capitol” in the
United States with 486 confirmed cases of animal
rabies. Policies were passed regarding animal
vaccination and animal control officers worked to
remove dangerous animals from populated areas.
In addition, a
Nutrition Section was formed when a nutritionist was
hired to work in the health clinics, perform home
visits, and deliver community presentations.
Post World War II,
industrialization was a catalyst for the creation of
industrial facilities along the Houston Ship
Channel. Prior to 1952, pollution control in Harris
County was a function of the Texas Department of
Health. However, in 1952, after receiving 5,000
signatures from citizens who lived in the area
previously called Greens Bayou (long since annexed
by the city of Houston), Texas health officers held
hearings involving a release of sulfur dioxide and
sulfur trioxide that burned citizens skin and
clothing. Approximately one year later, Harris
County Commissioners Court made the decision that
all pollution control work at the local level be
done under the auspices of local government.
The Stream and Air Pollution
Control Section
became part of the
Harris County Health Unit in November, 1953. This
was the first joint air and water section in the
country. A separate laboratory soon followed. The
purpose of the new section was to gather evidence
related to state and federal statutes and take
violators to court. Since laws and rules regulating
air and water pollution were limited (the
Environmental Protection Agency was not created
until the 1970’s), the focus was on the health,
comfort and well being of the citizens. In 1956,
Dr. Walter A. Quebedeaux was named the
Anti-pollution Director.
Through the 1940’s
and in the early 1950’s great efforts were made to
reduce the spread of polio in Harris County through
the use of better sanitation techniques. Then in
April, 1955, Dr. Jonas Salk invented the polio
vaccine that put a stop to the polio epidemic.
Thereafter, Dr. Albert Sabin produced an oral polio
vaccine that was licensed in 1962.
1960’s
Harris County
Population
1960: 1,243,158
In the 1960’s, the
Harris County Health Unit continued to expand its
services to meet the public health needs of its
growing suburban population. Several sections were
added to the Sanitation Division. An Engineering
Section was created to monitor and regulate the
increasing number of water and sewage systems that
were developed to accommodate the increase of new
subdivisions. Recognizing the importance of
properly operating swimming pools to prevent
disease, sanitary engineers inspected public
swimming pools. An Industrial Hygiene Section
investigated small businesses for excessive noise,
potentially hazardous fumes, dusts and gases, poor
ventilation, and unprotected radiation producing
equipment.
In 1960, the results of a
health survey conducted by Harris County’s public
health department found an alarming number of people
still were not vaccinated against polio. The
county health department implemented a massive
immunization campaign in cooperation with the City
of Houston Health Department. Together, the
two public health agencies vaccinated over 100,000
people in a two-week period. As a result of
this public health effort, polio was no longer a threat to
Harris County residents.
In keeping with the
attention and funding focused on personal health
problems, Harris County Health Unit requested and
received a grant to provide educational and clinical
services in family planning. Dental Health also
began a limited clinical program “for the portion of
the population considered medically indigent.”
By 1962, Animal
Control was established within Harris County Health
Department. Their primary function was to provide
health education on zoonotic diseases - those
diseases transmitted from animals to humans. Rabies
Control continued to be part of the Sanitation
Division.
In 1964, Harris
County experienced an epidemic of St. Louis
encephalitis (SLE), a mosquito-borne disease,
resulting in 376 confirmed human cases and 34
deaths. Later that year, the Vector Control Section
was removed from the County Health Unit when a
Mosquito Control District was established by a
county-wide election. Upon its formation, the
Mosquito Control District was primarily involved in
the prevention and control of mosquito-borne
disease, particularly SLE.
In the mid-to-late
1960’s, sewage plants became overloaded due to rapid
population growth and development. The Stream
Section focused on evaluating sewage treatment
plants to reduce the incidence of typhoid fever and
dysentery from raw and improperly treated sewage.
1970’s
Harris County
Population
1970: 1,741,912
In 1971, the Stream
and Air Pollution Control Section was removed from
the Harris County Health Unit to become the Harris
County Pollution Control Department. By 1974, the
processes of complaint handling, report writing,
issuing violation notices, rechecks, sample tags,
and chain of custody were in place and withstood
many court challenges. Similarly, laboratory test
methods for air and water quality testing were
developed or existing methods revised so that they
could be run routinely. Many if not all of these
practices remain in place today and have been copied
by other local pollution control agencies interested
in developing an enforcement program.
The responsibility
for both rabies control and education was given to
Animal Control in 1973. There were many rabies
cases through the 1970’s. As a result, a massive vaccination
program had to be initiated.
Later in the decade,
the Harris County Health Department joined the City
of Houston Health Department in a combined effort of
administering the Supplemental Feeding Program for
Women, Infants and Children (WIC) in the community.
By the late 1970’s,
Commissioners Court had adopted state food safety
and sanitation rules for regulating restaurants and
other retail food facilities in Harris County.
1980’s
Harris County
Population
1980: 2,409,547
The 1980’s was a busy
and challenging decade for the Environmental Health
Division. In 1983, sanitarians educated home
owners, whose private water wells were flooded by
Hurricane Alicia, on proper chlorination methods.
Sanitarians also visited restaurants, grocery
stores, bakeries, and other food operations,
condemning over 260,000 pounds of spoiled food
subjected to high temperatures during the power
outages caused by the hurricane. Later that same
year, prolonged subfreezing temperatures caused
water pipes to burst throughout the greater Houston
area. Sanitarians closed all retail food
establishments that had no or little water available
for cleaning and sanitation operations.
In 1987, the Texas
legislature granted counties the ability to require
food permits through a county court order. Although
sanitarians had been inspecting food establishments
in Harris County since the 1940’s, the new law
allowed counties to enforce compliance with food and
sanitation regulations as a condition of receiving a
health permit. Procedures were developed to deny,
suspend, or revoke a health permit for unsanitary
conditions.
In 1988, due to the
diligence of the Environmental Engineering Section,
the numbers of water systems serving residential
areas that were in compliance with the Safe Drinking
Water Act increased. The position of Occupational
Health Specialist was created to provide
consultative services to small companies and to
investigate indoor air complaints, auto paint shops,
radiator repair, landscaping firms, and retail
plating companies.
Personal health
services also increased, with the funding of the
refugee health program and the opening of the first
sexually transmitted disease clinic located in the
Baytown Health Center. The county health department
provided preventive health services to the community
at 5 health centers: Antoine, Baytown, Humble, La
Porte and Southeast.
1990’s
Harris County
Population
1990: 2,818,199
In the early 1990’s,
Environmental Health inspectors began conducting
environmental investigations of child lead
poisonings, examining every possible environmental
exposure to lead from the paint on a house to
nonprescription remedies for illnesses to the water
pipes. Parents were educated regarding avoidance
and removal of lead sources while Harris County
Department of Community and Economic Development
provided funding to remove lead based paint. In
1997, Harris County successfully convinced state
lawmakers to allow the county, as a population of
2.3 million or more, to require food manager’s
training for all restaurants, grocery stores,
bakeries, nursing homes, and other food service
establishments.
In 1995, Harris County Mosquito
Control District became a division of Harris County
Health Department. Three years later, Harris County
Pollution Control Department merged with Harris
County Health Department. With the merging of
Mosquito Control and Pollution Control with the
County Health Department, the name was changed to
Harris County Public Health & Environmental Services
(HCPHES) to better reflect the added
responsibilities of the public health agency.
2000-Present
Harris County population
2000: 3,400,578
In order to reflect
new challenges and increased responsibilities in the
new millennium, several of the divisions of Harris
County Public Health & Environmental Services were
renamed. Environmental Health and Pollution Control
Divisions merged and were renamed Environmental
Public Health Division. Rabies & Animal Control
Division became Veterinary Public Health Division.
Community Health Services Division was renamed
Disease Control and Clinical Prevention. Health
Education was renamed Health Education and Promotion
Division. In addition, the Offices of Public
Information, Policy and Planning, and Public Health
Preparedness were added to the HCPHES organizational
structure to reflect the increased emphasis on these
important aspects of the delivery of public health.
Large scale public
health emergencies such Tropical Storm Allison, the
September 11th attack on the World Trade
Center, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita as well as
preparedness for a pandemic influenza epidemic
brought focus and attention to the role that public
health plays in disasters and major health crises.
A Homeland Security grant added both personnel and
equipment to assist emergency response efforts and
preparedness. HCPHES routinely
participates in drills that are designed to exercise
the local “all-hazards” plan.
Air monitoring
initiatives and air sampling capabilities increased,
while partnerships and collaborative efforts with
local agencies and citizen groups were formed to
better the region’s air quality problems. In 2002,
the first ozone monitor was installed and operated
by the Environmental Public Health Division. By
2005, the number of ozone monitors would increase to
twelve as part of the Harris County Public Health
Ozone Monitoring Network. Information obtained from
the monitors is available to the public via the
Internet. This important information assists
at-risk individuals and health professionals in
their decision making regarding outdoor activities.
With the introduction
of West Nile virus (WNV) into the United States in
1999 and its eventual spread to Harris County in
2002, WNV quickly became an important disease
concern. In order to address these issues, the
Mosquito Control Division incorporated a system of
integrated pest management (IPM). Key components of IPM include mosquito/bird surveillance, Geographic
Information Systems (GIS) technology, insecticide
resistance management, innovative applied research,
and educational outreach.
In June 2005, a
natural gas well blowout and fire in Crosby resulted
in the long term evacuation of 53 families. The
Environmental Public Health Division played a key
role in a multi-jurisdictional response by providing
technical oversight and response recommendations.
As part of the emergency response to determine
health impacts, the Division conducted air
monitoring and drinking water sampling and
analysis.
On August 31, 2005,
HCPHES participated in a multi-jurisdictional
response when Harris County Judge Robert Eckels
opened the Reliant Park-Astrodome complex to receive
and house persons evacuating areas of Louisiana
devastated by Hurricane Katrina. Over the following
month, HCPHES was involved in building and managing
a public health infrastructure for a “city” of over
27,000 residents. In total, more than 500 HCPHES
employees worked around the clock to ensure the
health and safety of the evacuee population by
overseeing medical operations, operating a mass
vaccination clinic, conducting epidemiological
surveillance activities in order to detect and
prevent disease outbreaks among the evacuee
population, inspecting Reliant Park facilities for
safety and sanitation, sheltering pets of evacuees,
and providing information to the public.
In September 2005,
Hurricane Rita threatened Harris County as a
Category 4 storm. Guided by the
recently-developed HCPHES Severe Weather Response
Plan, HCPHES assembled a departmental team
assigned to the overall Harris County Incident
Command team. The command team was staged at the
Greater Houston Transportation and Emergency
Management Center – known as Houston TranStar –
remaining there from two days prior to landfall
through the duration of the storm. Although Harris
County was spared from much of Hurricane Rita’s
devastation, the resultant fires, overflows from
sewage and industrial facilities and storm debris
disposal problems that occurred in the area were
promptly addressed by HCPHES.
In the spring of
2006, HCPHES was notified of a local high school
student who contracted rabies by touching an
infected bat. The previous human case of rabies in
Harris County occurred nearly ten years earlier. In
the coming days and weeks, HCPHES coordinated a
multi-disciplinary public health response to
determine the cause of the exposure, prevent illness
among others who may have been exposed and educate
and inform the community about rabies prevention.
HCPHES responded by utilizing five key components:
incident command structure, case investigation,
contact investigation, coordination and
collaboration and public information.
Today, HCPHES
provides public health services to Harris County
residents through six health clinics, 13 WIC
centers, veterinary public health, mosquito control,
environmental public health, education and
promotion, public health emergency preparedness and
public information.
|
.jpg)
