Peterborough Public Health Temporarily Reducing Services to Focus on Local COVID-19 Response

Staff Redeployed to Increase Local Vaccination Effort

Peterborough Public Health is temporarily redeploying most of its staff to increase vaccination clinic capacity and support the local response to the COVID-19 Omicron variant. This will result in several public health services being paused or reduced effective Friday, December 17, 2021.

“Recent data shows the highly-transmissible Omicron variant will cause a rapid increase in COVID-19 cases, and predicts significant impact on the capacity of our healthcare system,” explained Dr. Thomas Piggott, Medical Officer of Health. “Peterborough Public Health is taking an all hands-on deck approach to vaccinate as many eligible residents as possible. As a result, staff are being redeployed, with some services temporarily paused or reduced as we navigate the next couple of weeks.”

Dr. Piggott also said starting on Friday, December 17, 2021, Peterborough Public Health offices at 185 King St. in Peterborough will be closed until further notice, and that it will no longer handle general phone inquiries.

Other public health activities and programs that are temporarily suspended include:

Sexual Health Clinic and Services (Physician and Nurse-led clinics)
Routine immunization clinics
Vaccine orders and pick-ups (for routine immunization)
In-person prenatal classes (online prenatal modules continue to be available)Programming and activities in schools (elementary, secondary, and post-secondary)
Food handler training classes

These services have been impacted due to the redeployment of staff to assist with the response. PPH is continually assessing the situation, and will be communicating any new developments.

The following services will be temporarily reduced:

Community Dental Health Clinic – emergency treatment only
Work with community partners including meetings and committee work
Healthy Babies Healthy Children program
Infant Toddler Development program
Outbreak investigations
Surveillance and follow-up for diseases of public health significance
Food programs
Food safety program (reduced)
Routine inspections of facilities
Safe water program
Rabies prevention and control program
Tobacco Enforcement
Health Hazards Prevention and Control (prioritization of urgent health hazards)
Sewage disposal program
Naloxone distribution
Early Warning and Opioid Overdose Surveillance

For more information, please visit www.peterboroughpublichealth.ca.

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For further information, please contact:

Sarah Gill
Communications Team
705-743-1000, ext. 352