The La Plata County Public Health Department rolled out a new program called the Healthy Homes Program which helps homeowners stay safe from toxins within their home. By Sadie Smith. This story is sponsored by Payroll Department and M&R Plumbing.
La Plata County Public Health Department - https://www.lpcgov.org/departments/public_health_2/about_us/index.php
Healthy Homes - https://www.lpcgov.org/departments/public_health_2/environmental_health/healthy_homes.php
National Center for Healthy Housing - https://nchh.org/
Payroll Department - https://payrolldept.biz/
M&R Plumbing - https://www.mandrhomeservices.com/
Is your home making you sick? The La Plata County Health Department has a new program to identify environmental hazards in your house, and many aren't what you think they are. You're watching the "Local News Network," brought to you by The Payroll Department and M&R Plumbing. I'm Sadie Smith. The Healthy Home program can help you reduce home toxins, improve living conditions, and prevent illness to lighten the demand for healthcare. The program consists of three portions.
There's a site visit portion where we work with homeowners to identify potentially hazards within their homes. There's another portion of it where we create a bunch of partnerships with community members to assist these individuals if we identify hazards within their home. And then the third portion of it is a educational component where we'll actually be providing general public education on different healthy home strategies.
This program is available to all La Plata County residents. However, home visits are reserved for income-restricted homeowners. Visits are free to those who qualify and identify anything in the home that could cause illness or negatively impact health.
So we're identifying things such as radon levels with the home. We're discussing potential lead containing materials that could be producing lead dust that could affect your health. We're talking about, potentially, asbestos containing materials and how that could affect your health. We're talking about just general cleaning of the home, looking at potential pest or rodent infestations. We're looking at humidity levels. Just different things like that that can impact your health within your home.
Because we spend a considerable amount of time in our homes, Prosise says we should take steps to reduce the factors that may contribute to illness. The Healthy Homes program follows The Principles for a Healthy Home as outlined by the National Center for Healthy Homes.
If you reduce the amount of dust in your house, you can reduce the amount of inhalation of any of those hazards, reduce potential asthma attacks. If you have any issues with asthma, keep it ventilated. So what that can do is reduce humidity within your home.
The Healthy Homes program will provide free educational sessions to discuss The Principles of a Healthy Home. Two sessions will be held in April, two in May, and the department will have a stand at the Farmer's Market to provide education.
So the ultimate goal of this program is really to reduce the impact of the burden on our healthcare system and to make people healthier within their home.
Additional details and assessment requests may be found on the La Plata County Public Health Department website. Find more information about this and other stories at durangolocal.news. Thank you for watching this edition of the "Local News Network." I'm Sadie Smith.
