With senior citizens being urged to quarantine over reports that they're most at lethal risk from the coronavirus, senior centers and support groups are increasing home delivery and distribution of food while opening this service up to anyone in the public who is older than 60.

After the eight senior centers in Butler County closed Tuesday, the Butler County Area Agency on Aging and various senior centers across the county transitioned to provide food for senior citizens.

As the worldwide pandemic of COVID-19 spreads, researchers believe older adults are particularly susceptible to the respiratory illness, which can cause pneumonia and symptoms such as fever, cough and shortness of breath. With that in mind, Bethany Harold, agency director, made the decision to close the senior centers, following the recommendation from the state.

“Senior centers are more than food. It's where they can socialize, comfort each other, educate them,” Harold said. “But I understand the risk. It was a hard decision. I see them as my own grandparents. What would I want for them. You just don't know the implications of everything so why take that risk?”

The county senior centers serve 640 consumers with in-home services like bathing, cleaning and responding to the “I've fallen and I can't get up calls,” Harold said. They currently have 150 individuals that get home-delivered meals only, and, in the last six months, 2,000 individuals have attended center-related activities.

Turning to food services, Harold said they are setting up distribution centers across the county where seniors can pick up non-perishable meals that are heart healthy and low in sodium. Those who can't drive can contact the agency to arrange for deliveries.

Additionally, the agency is helping Meals on Wheels with frozen meals at no cost to the organization, Harold said.The assistance is welcomed by Mary Pataky, program director of Butler Meals on Wheels.Typically, the organization delivers hot meals daily to senior citizens. But they have altered their policy to heed government warnings against the spread of the virus. They now send out a weekly box of mixed food to their clients to reduce personal contact with the volunteers.“We're trying to avoid all of that,” Pataky said.Their meals now consist of non-perishable items along with fresh vegetables, fruits and milk.“It's a lot to think about with things changing rapidly. Our main goal is to keep our clients fed. We don't want to let anybody down so we've been working long, busy hours to get that done but that's what we're here for,” Pataky said. “We just want to provide food to those who need it most at this time.”Pataky said that the organization has been receiving calls all day from people who are concerned for senior citizens.If anyone is interested in donating food, Pataky said these items are at the top of the list: individual-sized items that could be boxed, like microwaveable meals, fruit cups, applesauce, crackers and items of that nature.“We're truly hoping this doesn't affect the community or the world for a long time,” Pataky said. “We're hoping that we can continue to do what we're doing to take care of people.”

The two organizations are not the only groups considering senior citizens during this state emergency.Responding to the panicked shopping that has kept countless aisles empty, Dollar General has designated the first hour at its more than 16,000 stores in 44 states to be reserved for older shoppers. The stores generally open at 8 a.m.“During these unprecedented times, Dollar General is diligently working to meet the ongoing needs of our customers and communities,” said Todd Vasos, Dollar General's CEO, in a prepared statement.All Dollar General stores, including the ones in Butler County, are encouraging customers to delay their shopping by an hour for the senior citizens.Jim Perko, owner of Miller's Meats on Main Street in Butler, noted that his older customers like shopping in the afternoon.Instead of designating specific hours to help seniors out, the store is limiting the amount customers can buy to five pounds of meat and only one loaf of bread.“Our suppliers are limited, there's dwindling meat supplies,” Perko said. He also observed that the chickens they have received are smaller in size than they used to be.Miller's has also expanded delivery service and is limiting the number of customers in the store to 10 at a time.“We've put limits on everything,” Perko said. “It's a lot of greed in my opinion.”