Columbus County Health Department unveils 2025-2029 strategic plan; names obesity, substance use and lung cancer as top priorities

The Columbus County Health Department presented its 2023 community health assessment and a new strategic plan for 2025 through 2029 during the Board of Commissioners meeting on Dec. 2.

Health department staff said the assessment, completed every four years with citizen input and secondary data sources, shows persistent challenges: poverty, a local life expectancy roughly six years shorter than the state average, limited access to specialty care, high adult obesity rates, elevated overdose death rates and a higher smoking prevalence (23%) than the state average. The department identified obesity, substance use and lung cancer as its top three priorities.

The health director told commissioners hard copies of the community health assessment are available at all county library branches and in the health department lobby; the assessment is also posted on the county and state public-health websites.

The department's strategic plan (2025'2029) sets a mission to prevent illness, promote wellness, protect the environment and educate the community while advancing equity and collaboration. Key strategies described include updating workforce development policy to recruit and promote internally, strengthened partnerships with faith-based organizations for obesity prevention, a social-media plan to raise awareness of public-health services, pursuing revenue and state legislative partnerships for facility improvements, and expanding opioid response efforts including an opioid task-force approach, grant-seeking and possible Narcan distribution strategies (including vending machines).

On lung cancer, the department said it will implement "Catch My Breath," a school-based prevention program requested by local school systems, once staff training and coverage are in place. The health director noted the department's main facility was built in 1939 and said facility and infrastructure upgrades remain a priority.

Commissioners asked clarifying questions about the data vintages (staff said some data lag by 3'4 years) and about vaping policy work underway; planning staff at the same meeting were taking up zoning and retail regulation changes for vape shops. The health department indicated additional grant and program funding would be pursued to support the priorities listed in the strategic plan.

Speakers quoted below appeared during the health presentation and question period.