The Erie Health Department’s new community health kiosk is already seeing significant use, providing residents with free access to essential health and hygiene products around the clock.
Since launching the kiosk at the beginning of October, health department officials said it has recorded 757 visits, including 300 during its first week. Officials said the early numbers highlight the need for these resources in the community.
“There is a need for harm reduction products out there in our community, whether it is Narcan, the test strips for drugs, COVID and flu,” said Ellen Hill, the Health Improvement and Preparedness Supervisor for the Health Department. “There’s a lot of things that people need access to that maybe they need access to it after hours when they come into the health department.”
Located outside the Erie Health Department on West 2nd Street, the kiosk offers free health and hygiene products 24 hours a day, seven days a week. A sharps disposal container is also available, allowing community members to safely dispose of used needles and other sharp objects.
According to Hill, “We have a code that unlocks it, it’s 12345, pretty simple. From there you pick your item and then after you get your item picked, you have to enter in your zipcode, so we can monitor the usage of where it goes so then we can focus on expanding it out whether it’s more machines under our agency or another agency we have a better idea of where we want to go with it.”
As the weather gets colder, the health department plans to adjust the products available to meet seasonal needs. As Hill explained, “In the kiosk, we will be going to more winter based products. So right now we have pretty thin socks, we are looking at putting in hats, gloves, thicker socks, things like that. Here at the Health Department we also have respiratory kits. In that we have hand sanitizer, Covid, Flu, RSV combo tests as well as tissues , so if you think you are sick you can get them out of kiosk or get them inside as well.”
Hill says the ZIP codes with the highest reported use so far are 16502 and 16507.
Health department officials plan to use the data to evaluate community needs and determine whether to expand the program with additional kiosks through their agency or in partnership with other organizations.