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Budget Amendment - Additional Communicable Disease Funding
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INFORMATION CONTACT:
Dennis Joyner, Human Services Agency, Public Health Department Director, 704-296-4801
ACTION REQUESTED:
1) Recognize, receive and appropriate $47,100 in FY25 funding (Agreement Addendum 583) from the NC Division of Public Health for Refugee Health Assessments to the Human Services Public Health Department and 2) approve Budget Amendment 8.
PRIOR BOARD ACTIONS:
None.
BACKGROUND:
Refugees are individuals who are unable to return to their home countries due to a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group. Mostly via the United States (U.S.) Refugee Admissions Program, refugees arrive to the U.S. and North Carolina from all around the globe. In fiscal year 2023, the largest numbers have arrived in North Carolina from Ukraine, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Afghanistan, Burma, and Syria. Refugees are a high-risk and vulnerable population that face special health challenges due to their exposure to deteriorating conditions usually attributed to circumstances such as war, trauma, and forced migration. In many refugee camps, sanitation, food supplies, and health care services are limited, which can have implications for malnutrition, infectious diseases, and chronic conditions. Therefore, depending on their country of origin, refugees are at an increased risk for many diseases, both infectious and non-infectious, not commonly seen in the U.S.-born population.
The primary goal of the North Carolina Refugee Health Program is to ensure that health problems of newly arrived refugees that could pose a threat to public health or interfere with the effective resettlement of the refugees are promptly identified and treated. Health problems are identified through health assessments provided to refugees generally in their county of resettlement and in the local health department....
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