Communicable Disease

Working to Keep Douglas County Healthy

Disease prevention and control is a cooperative effort involving health care providers, local and state health department personnel and members of the community. Communicable diseases can be transmitted from person to person or from animal to person. The Communicable Disease program at DPHN works to prevent the emergence and spread of communicable diseases through investigation and education. This includes collecting and analyzing disease reports, studying risk factors, protecting exposed individuals and families, developing guidelines for disease prevention and control, and planning and responding to public health emergencies involving communicable diseases. Oregon state law requires the tracking of communicable diseases in order to prevent and control disease outbreaks. To ensure the safety of the community, the law also requires physicians, healthcare providers and labs to report all “reportable” diseases to DPHN. ​  
 

Links to additional resources:

August 17th, 2022

DPHN has been allocated a limited amount of the Jynneos vaccine.  While monkeypox (hMPXV) can spread to anyone through close contact, skin-to-skin contact regardless of gender or sexual orientation, most persons that have tested positive in the current world wide outbreak have been gay or bisexual men.  If you have had more than one male sexual partner in the past 14 days, and would like to be vaccinated please call 541-677-5825 and ask for Paul.  If you have symptoms or additional questions about monkeypox, please contact our Chief Infectious Disease Epidemiologist, Laura, at 541-677-5814.