COLOMBIA – Rick Toomey, who led the South Carolina public health agency during the COVID-19 pandemic, resigned on Wednesday, citing the need to stay healthy after his recent scare and desire to stay in Beaufort full time after the birth of his first grandchild.
Toomey, 65, took a two-week leave in April to control blood pressure. Your last day at the Department of Health and Environmental Control of SC will be on June 10.
Board members thanked him for leading the agency during the unprecedented crisis.
“It’s a sad day for us,” said council chairman Mark Elam.
The board accepted his resignation at a time when positive coronavirus cases increased again in the state, reaching a weekly record. Tests for the virus have increased in recent weeks, surpassing the state’s target of 110,000 for the month on Tuesday.
Achieving that goal influenced the timing of his resignation, he said.
“With my recent health experience that is under control and doing well, it made me take a step back to access where I want to be in my life right now and with the birth of my first grandchild,” said Toomey, later noting that his grandson is 3 and a half months old. “It makes me understand that I would like to be in Beaufort and the commitment to be in Columbia five days a week is difficult … I don’t want to have worked my whole life and not taken a step back.”
Toomey’s wife is a doctor at a Beaufort hospital and he said he also wants to be there to support her.
“It is never a good time to make a decision like this,” he continued. “The state, the nation has gone through really challenging times during the past three months. We are in a better place today than we were a month ago, two months ago … It’s time for me to get away.”
DHEC has not publicly opposed Governor Henry McMaster’s efforts to reopen South Carolina, even without the prolonged decline in the number of coronavirus cases, as recommended by federal health officials. South Carolina has lifted the ban on most activities, except those that attract large crowds, such as cinemas, nightclubs and stadiums.
The 20 deaths reported on Wednesday set a new daily record in South Carolina. Since the pandemic began in March, 466 South Carolinians have died of COVID-19. At least 10,623 have been diagnosed with the virus, which can be deadly, especially for the elderly and people with underlying diseases such as heart disease and diabetes. Two-thirds of the South Carolinians killed by the disease were over 70 years old.
It is not known exactly how many people fell ill, as only the very sick, health professionals and first responders were tested before the statewide increase that focused on nursing homes and rural communities and minorities who are disproportionately sick and dying because they don’t have health care access. In all, 181,154 people have been tested since the beginning of March.
Tests have actually slowed in the past few days, but Toomey attributed this to the fact that there are no mobile sites set up for two days during the extended holiday. The number of tests will go up again, he said. In addition to mobile testing, more than 140 providers offer testing, and that number will increase to more than 200 in the coming weeks, he said.
For many weeks, South Carolina ranked among the lowest in the country in tests per capita, a problem that DHEC attributed to supplies that went to the states with the most cases.
Toomey, a former hospital administrator, was appointed director of DHEC in late 2018, after a 17-month search.
His resignation came a day before the expected final meeting of McMaster’s AccelerateSC task force, which advised him on how to safely reopen the South Carolina economy. Toomey led a subcommittee of that group.
The Republican governor has consistently lifted mandatory restrictions and closings in the past month, most recently allowing tourist attractions of all sizes to reopen before the Memorial Day holiday.
Youth sports and adult recreation leagues can return to athletic fields for practice in a few days. This will leave the only activities and businesses still forbidden to open such as bowling alleys, sports for spectators – both university and professional – and places that fill many people inside, such as concert halls, theaters, nightclubs and arenas.
McMaster said that people will continue to contract the virus and expects the number of patients to increase as more people are tested. The important thing is that people realize that they still need to distance themselves socially and take precautions, especially with the most vulnerable, despite the lifting of restrictions.
As for those who didn’t during Memorial Day weekend, he said, “I think people are ready to go out and it did.”
But he has no plans to close anything.
“We cannot have an epidemiologist, a police officer, a mother and a father following everyone, reminding them of what they should do,” said the governor. “The virus is still here. It is as deadly as before and it can be fatal, so we must be careful. We cannot force everyone to do everything. People armed with knowledge and information must use common sense and take care of themselves and their neighbors and families, and we’ll be fine. “
Toomey said he would like “I could have stayed a little longer”.
“There is a feeling that the mission has not been completed,” he said. “But I’m not sure if the DHEC mission has been completed.”
Marshall Taylor, the agency’s chief attorney, will again serve as interim director. He has been in this position three times before, most recently during Toomey’s health scare. He previously took office from January to May 2015 and in January and February 2019, when the state Senate confirmed Toomey as director.