Medical needs shelter to open in 2016

People using home health care or needing care from a family member soon will have a safe place to go during a disaster: Mississippi’s first stand-alone State and Regional Medical Needs Shelter.

Ground was broken on the shelter earlier this month. The $7.7 million facility will be located on Coy Avenue in Wiggins.

“This is a one-of-a-kind shelter we have been able to put together for the people of Mississippi,” said Jim Craig, state Department of Health director of health protection. “We chose Wiggins because it’s just down (U.S.) 49, so (people) could travel up 49.

“A lot of times our medical evacuees would be trying to get to Jackson.”

The 23,416-square-foot shelter will provide a place to stay in an emergency for people with medical needs exceeding what can be offered in a general population shelter. It is self-sustaining for 36 hours, with a backup power source and sewer and water connections.

Greg Flynn, spokesman for Mississippi Emergency Management Agency, said currently community colleges around the state offer shelter to residents with medical needs.

“They would bring in nurses and external equipment and have to set that up — modify some rooms so they could accommodate people who were coming in,” he said.

In the Hattiesburg area, Pearl River Community College offered such a shelter.

But many of the community college shelters aren’t ranked to withstand a Category 5 hurricane, Craig said.

Flynn said the shelter in Wiggins is not like anything one can find nearby.

“It’s one of only two in the nation that is a stand-alone medical needs shelter,” he said. “The other is in Florida.”

It is also built to withstand winds up to 200 mph. It will contain a negative-pressure infectious disease isolation room — the first of its kind in any medical needs shelter in the nation.

“Stone County would have the only medical needs shelter that would be rated for a Category 5 (storm),” Craig said.

He said the shelter would be sufficient in a hurricane scenario, and with the negative-pressure isolation room — in a pandemic.

Flynn said he hopes the community colleges wouldn’t be used anymore in a storm.

“We wouldn’t need the junior colleges, God forbid in a catastrophic situation,” he said.

He said it’s possible people from Hattiesburg might need the shelter.

“It certainly would be used, say, if a tornado struck Hattiesburg,” he said. “We could get them down to Wiggins very quickly.”

Funding for the shelter is provided through Hazard Mitigation Grant Program funds and through partnerships with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, MEMA and others.

The shelter is anticipated to be open for the 2016 hurricane season.

Flynn said it is time the state has a facility for people with medical needs.

“Hurricane Katrina taught us all a lesson, and one of those was to properly care for people with medical needs,” he said.