Kamloops getting its own medical health officer

Kamloops is finally getting its own medical health officer within Interior Health, after the position had remained vacant for 10 years.

Dr. Carol Fenton will be focussing on the COVID-19 response — like all other medical health officers — but that wasn't why she was hired, the health authority says. Interior Health said in a statement Fenton was recruited before the pandemic. 

"She will be permanently located in Kamloops later this year, and like all of our (medical health officers) will be engaged in work in local communities as well as IH-wide priorities,” a spokesperson for Interior Health told iNFOnews.ca.

Medical health officers are responsible for the health and wellbeing of residents in the region. Their responsibilities include disease and injury surveillance, communicable disease prevention, environmental public health, and care facility licensing, according to the health authority's website.

There was a medical health officer in Kamloops until around 2010 when the Interior Health authority made the decision to consolidate all of the medical health officers for the region in Kelowna. 

Kamloops Mayor Ken Christian said he will be welcoming the return of a Medical Health Officer to Kamloops with open arms.

"Our medical community, and our local government, our education communities and certainly some of the disadvantaged populations have suffered because of the lack of that population health expertise right here in Kamloops," Christian said. 

The medical health officer will bring a level of expertise to city projects and committees, in addition to acting as a liaison to the medical community through the Royal Inland Hospital, he said. 

"I'm looking forward, as is council, that when she is able, that she appear with us here in council chambers."

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