Consider, for a moment, two neighborhoods in Denver: Platt Park and Westwood. Both are in the southern half of the city, separated by a two-mile drive along Mississippi Avenue over the railroad tracks. Both are home to lots of young families. And both, of course, are 16 months into weathering the coronavirus pandemic. But, according […]
Denver Public Health
Posted inCOVID, Health, News
“It’s like Lady Gaga tickets”: Colorado health officials need help managing vaccine demand
At Lyon’s Corner Drug, a historic pharmacy and old-fashioned soda fountain on the main strip in Steamboat Springs, more than 100 older residents lined up on a bitter cold morning when the temperature dipped to single digits. The pharmacists’ children, two of them dressed as Disney princesses, delivered ice cream and caramels to the folks […]
Posted inCOVID, Education, Health, Politics and Government
Roadmap to return Colorado students to school calls for more testing, contact tracing
Asserting that schools have proved themselves to be safe, Gov. Jared Polis and a group of public health and education leaders laid out a roadmap Tuesday for getting children back to the classroom as soon as possible in 2021. But the report is short on details about how the state will help schools overcome logistical […]
Posted inCOVID, Health, News, Politics and Government
Homelessness in Denver is obvious, but the never-ending work to solve it is harder to see
The hundreds of green cots that lined the vast hall at the National Western Complex are gone, and the men who slept there have been bused to homeless shelters around the city. In small groups, they gathered their belongings into duffle bags last week and waited — socially distanced on metal folding chairs — for […]
Posted inEnvironment, Health, News, Outdoors, Water
E. coli fouls 100 Colorado waterways. But managers aren’t sure how big the threat is to people playing in streams.
Braving the midday blaze on a particularly hot Front Range Friday, Evan Smart and a friend lingered near their inner tubes, beer cans in hand, after a refreshing float down Boulder Creek. “Over my whole life of coming into the creek, I’ve never heard of anybody getting sick,” said Smart, a 26-year-old paramedic. I’ve always […]
Posted inColoradans, Growth, Health, News, Politics and Government
Sweeps of Denver homeless camps go against coronavirus guidance
By Jakob Rodgers, Kaiser Health News Melody Lewis lives like a nomad in the heart of downtown Denver. Poking her head out of her green tent on a recent June day, the 57-year-old points to the place a few blocks away where city crews picked up her tent from a sidewalk median earlier this spring […]
Posted inCOVID, Health, News
Deaths of at least 32 Colorado nursing home, senior living center residents linked to coronavirus
The deaths of at least 32 residents of nursing homes and senior living centers in Colorado have been linked to the new coronavirus, including six fatalities at one Greeley facility and four at one in Littleton, The Colorado Sun has learned. That is nearly one-third of all coronavirus-related deaths in Colorado, where at least 112 […]
Posted inCOVID, Health, News, Politics and Government
Metro counties drop stay-at-home orders for one issued by state of Colorado
Three public health departments that on Wednesday issued stay-at-home orders for 2.5 million Front Range residents rescinded them on Thursday, saying they conflict with the statewide order issued by Gov. Jared Polis. The directors of Boulder County Public Health, Jefferson County Public Health and Tri-County Health Department said their organizations, representing five metro Denver counties, […]
Posted inCOVID, Education, Health, News
Colorado wants to ensure coronavirus won’t affect low-income, minority communities disproportionately
Pandemics come for us all in equal measure, right? Aren’t we all equally vulnerable? Not exactly. As the first cases of coronavirus arrive in the state, Colorado health and social services officials say they are striving to make sure lower-income residents and people of color are not disproportionately impacted by the illness and potential economic […]
Posted inCrime and Courts, Environment, Health, News
“Where are we going to go now?” Denver closes park near Capitol, clears homeless camp citing rats, health hazards
Denver health officials see Lincoln Park across from the Colorado Capitol as a rat-infested, disease-harboring public danger they need to clean up. The few dozen people experiencing homelessness, who have been living there in tents, some for weeks, see it as home. On Wednesday morning the city used its public health authority to shut down […]