By Taylor Stuck, Herald-Dispatch of Huntington
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — There are two major threats facing the senior population of West Virginia.
One is a new virus making its way around the globe that greatly affects the elderly.
The other, as Cabell County Community Services Organization Executive Director Charles Holley sees it, is the social isolation seniors are now enduring in an attempt to protect themselves from that new virus.
“The mortality rate is as high for (social isolation) as the virus is for some seniors,” Holley said. “It’s a real Catch-22 when we limit senior social activities. We are trading one bad thing for another.”
CCCSO is working to find ways to keep the seniors they serve from becoming too isolated and fed during these unprecedented times.
Following Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines, all nonessential activities at CCCSO’s four senior centers and other locations have been halted. Lunch is still being provided. In-home care is still being provided and meals are still being delivered.
Holley said coordinators of the senior centers have also been given a list of all the seniors who come to the congregate setting for service and the coordinators are calling them at least three times a week.
He said they are looking at ways they can provide some social activities for seniors while still keeping them safe.
But CCCSO is preparing for the event they cannot get to those seniors who do not live in their centers — which is about 500 people. …
