Council opposes syringe program
OROVILLE >> Oroville City Administrator Bill LaGrone presented the Oroville City Council with a letter of opposition to the California Department of Public Health’s proposed Syringe Exchange Program regulatory authority at Tuesday’s City Council meeting.
LaGrone said that with opinions of a syringe program aside, he felt the state is trying to divert local authority, in this instance the existence of an exchange program. In the letter, he said there should not be a one-size-fits-all for city government and how regulations are controlled.
While Oroville has never had a syringe exchange program, councilors and city staff mentioned Tuesday that in April 2020 the council voted not to allow exchange programs in any zoning areas in Oroville.
LaGrone presented the letter to councilors in hopes of hearing input or possible changes that could be made, or if councilors would authorize the letter to be sent. LaGrone asked if he should sign for all of the council on one line or if the council would like individual lines for each member to sign.
All councilors asked for a line for their signature. Vice Mayor Scott Thomson said he thinks the letter has more strength behind it with all the councilors’ signatures.
A motion to authorize the letter of opposition inclusive of signatures by all councilors was passed unanimously.
Prior to LaGrone’s presentation, councilors passed a unanimous vote to accept the California Governor’s Office of Emergency
Services’ Hazard Mitigation Program for $1,812,216 over three years. The program help funds eight temporary positions lasting three years in the planning, building and code enforcement departments in Oroville. A motion was made and passed unanimously.
Prior to the vote a motion was made by Mayor Chuck Reynolds to create a standalone department and recreate a department head, however that motion failed 3- 4.
“That department head just throws me,” said Councilor Janet Goodson.
Councilors passed a vote to rename the Municipal
Auditorium in Oroville to the Oroville Convention Center with a vote of 5-2, with Councilors Art Hatley and Goodson voting no.
Councilors also approved unanimously a three-year contract for goat grazing vegetation management at 15 Oroville locations at a cost of $80,010 annually or $240,030 over three years.
Consent calendar
After Councilor Krysi Riggs recused herself, the council voted unanimously to accept the 2020 Community Development Block Grant for $193,500 for Axiom Youth Services while establishing a budget for program activities.
Prior to the vote, the council approved the other five items on the consent calendar with a unanimous vote.
• Councilors approved an annual report for the housing successor agency for the fiscal year ending in 2020. • Councilors also approved the housing element progress report for 2020. • Councilors accepted a $500,000 grant as part of the 2020 Community Development Block Grant Allocation for the YMCA Stars Club Enrichment Program. • Councilors accepted the 2020 Community Development Block Grant for $387,250 for Catalyst Domestic Violence while establishing a budget for program activities. • Councilors accepted the 2019 Investment Partnership Grant for $1 million for Catalyst Domestic Violence while establishing a budget for program activities.
In the public hearings Tuesday, James Hamil from the California Statewide Community Development Authority presented a pair of hearings for refinancing at the Oroville Apartments and Oroville Manor Apartments. Hamil said the financing will continue to extend affordability of units at both locations for 55 years. Both hearings were passed by the council unanimously.
The council will next meet at 4:30 p.m. April 6 at 1735 Montgomery St. in Oroville. To participate in the meeting, email public comments to publiccomment@cityoforoville.org before 2 p.m. Tuesday.
John Abraham’s colonoscopy was postponed for several months because of the pandemic. When he finally got it, doctors found a growth too big to be removed safely during the scope exam. He had to wait several weeks for surgery, then several more to learn it had not yet turned cancerous.
“I absolutely wonder if I had gotten screened when I was supposed to have, if this would have been different” and surgery could have been avoided, said Abraham, a mortgage banker in Peoria, Illinois.
Millions of colonoscopies, mammograms, lung scans, Pap tests and other cancer screenings were suspended for several months last spring in the United States and elsewhere as COVID-19 swamped medical care.
Now researchers are studying the impact, looking to see how many cancers were missed and whether tumors found since then are more advanced.
Already, there are hints of trouble. University of Cincinnati researchers found that when CT scans to check for lung cancer resumed in June, 29% of patients had suspicious nodules versus 8% in prior years.
Multiple studies suggest that fewer cancers were diagnosed last year, likely because of less screening. About 75 cancer organizations recently urged a return to prepandemic screening levels as soon as safely possible.
But tumors take years to develop, and some reports suggest that a few months’ delay in screening for certain types of cancer may not have been as bad as feared. For example, researchers in the Netherlands found that a lapse in that country’s mammography program did not lead to more cancers being found at a late stage after screening resumed.
The pandemic also bred some creative solutions,
such as wider use of tests that can be done at home. In Philadelphia, a large church partnered with local doctors and used its drivethru flu shot program to also pass out stool tests for colon cancer screening.
“We’re not afraid to try anything as it relates to health and wellness,” said the Rev. Leroy Miles of Enon Tabernacle Baptist Church. “The women were encouraging men to get the screening, saying, ‘I got my mammogram.’ And I’m saying, ‘ma’am, you have a colon too.’”
Screening’s merits
Screening tests differ in their risks and benefits, and health experts have long debated who should get which ones and how often. The pandemic lapse may serve as a “natural experiment” to see their value in modern times versus what’s known from studies done long ago.
Any difference in deaths may not be seen for years, and early detection is only one factor in survival. Treatment also matters and it was hurt by pandemic delays too.
Dr. Ned Sharpless, director of the U. S. National Cancer Institute, estimates there could be nearly 10,000 excess deaths over the next decade because of delayed detection and treatment of breast and colon cancers.
Postponing care “was prudent at one time” because of the risks of COVID-19 exposure, but deferring for too long “may turn one public health crisis into many others,” he wrote in the journal Science.
Based on what’s known about breast cancer deaths from past years in the United States, about 10% “could have been prevented if women were getting routine screening,” but 20% to 25% could have been prevented with appropriate treatment, said Dr. Otis Brawley, a Johns Hopkins University professor and former chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society.
“That’s not to say screening is not important, but many people think that cancer screening saves more lives than it actually does,” Brawley said.
A short-term delay may not hurt mortality much if screening resumes quickly, as it needs to do, he said.
Getting creative
When 43-year- old actor Chadwick Boseman died of colon cancer last summer, Miles feared for the 12,000 members of his Philadelphia church. Black people are more likely to die of the disease than other groups, and there was limited access to colonoscopies,
which can find and remove growths before they turn cancerous.
Miles, who has drawn more than 1,000 church members to other health events, called the University of Pennsylvania and said, “we know how to get people to come if you’re willing and able to set something up.”
Dr. Carmen Guerra had a federal grant to increase screening in racially diverse communities and realized that home tests could help. Studies show these tests, which look for blood in stool, help save lives. People put a tiny stool sample in a tube and mail it to a lab or, in this case, use a drop box at the church. If blood is found, the next step is colonoscopy.
Doctors passed out kits in the parking lot during a drive-thru flu shot event in October. Church members had to watch a video about colon cancer in advance and register to ensure they qualified for screening.
So far, 154 kits have been returned. Stacy Hill was among the 13 who tested positive. The 48-year- old Philadelphia woman had just lost her job and health insurance. Her colonoscopy revealed two growths that, like Abraham’s, were caught before they turned cancerous.