Bar Harbor Bank & Trust is demonstrating outstanding support for the Mount Desert Island community with a $37,400 grant to support MDI Hospital’s COVID-19 testing initiative, developed in concert with the Downeast COVID-19 Task Force. Bar Harbor Bank & Trust’s grant is targeted to benefit the Mount Desert Island Regional School System (AOS 91) as they strive to keep students, staff, and schools healthy and safe.
“MDI Hospital is grateful to Bar Harbor Bank & Trust for their continued leadership support in our community,” said Art Blank, President/CEO of MDI Hospital. “They have stepped up to help our Island schools stay on track during this pandemic, enabling a high-quality, evidence-based COVID-19 testing program.”
Initially, 500 staff members will be tested to establish a baseline and detect any existing cases. This will be followed by weekly sentinel testing of staff in pre-established cohorts. The AOS 91 tests will be conducted by MDI Hospital personnel and processed by Cambridge Innovation Center (CIC) Health, an incubator for innovative start-up and testing facilities. CIC collaborates with 100+ organizations throughout the United States, conducting some 4,000 tests daily. CIC Health is a founding partner of the Assurance Testing Alliance, a collaboration of professional organizations working to streamline and lower the costs of COVID-19 testing.
“Bar Harbor Bank & Trust is passionate about supporting the communities we serve, especially MDI which has been our home for more than 130 years. Ensuring the safety of our schools has a significant positive impact to the entire community, and proactive efforts like this testing program will help limit the spread of COVID-19 throughout MDI. We are honored to help support this partnership between MDI Hospital and AOS 91 to help keep our kids, teachers, and neighbors safe.” said Curtis Simard, President and CEO of Bar Harbor Bank & Trust.
An additional grant of $40K to support the AOS 91 testing initiative has been received from the Rural Health Hospital Program for expanding testing in rural communities. Thanks to these generous donations, COVID-19 tests will be conducted from November 2020 through June 2021 at no cost to district employees, and with no impact on current school budgets. “This testing program will be used to monitor our schools for evidence of community spread of COVID-19 in concert with current mitigation strategies,” explained Marc Gousse, PhD, Superintendent of the AOS 91 Mount Desert Regional School System.
The Downeast COVID-19 Task Force was established in the early days of the pandemic to explore community-based solutions and provide a forum for discussion of ongoing challenges around COVID-19 testing, contact tracing, and education. Current members include area town and chamber of commerce leaders, local legislators and leadership from MDI Hospital, Healthy Acadia, the Jackson Laboratory, Mount Desert Island Regional School System, College of the Atlantic and Acadia National Park.
About Mount Desert Island Hospital
Mount Desert Island Hospital serves the close-knit island and surrounding communities through a 25-bed critical access facility in Bar Harbor and a network of area health centers—all designed to provide comprehensive healthcare for residents and visitors.
Since it was established in 1897, the nonprofit hospital has grown into a premier rural healthcare organization with a retirement community and eight regional health centers, including a full-service behavioral health center and a dental clinic. Today, MDI Hospital employs more than 500 people and is the second-largest employer on MDI.
The mission of MDI Hospital is to provide compassionate care and strengthen the health of its community by embracing tomorrow’s methods and respecting time-honored values.
For more information and the latest updates, visit www.mdihospital.org.
