Craig Weinaug’s bringing the cookies. Mike Wildgen will hand out some T-shirts.

And after battling a persistent parasitic outbreak for more than two months, employees of the Lawrence-Douglas County Health Department will get a collective pat on the back next week from the community they serve.

“We’ll just go over and say, ‘We appreciate you,'” said Weinaug, Douglas County administrator. “We think they deserve it.”

More than 40 employees are expected to attend the department’s monthly staff meeting at the Community Health Building, 200 Maine.

Among the guests will be Weinaug and Wildgen, Lawrence’s city manager. The two administrators will be passing along the formal thanks of the Douglas County Commission and Lawrence City Commission, on behalf of all county residents.

Virtually all department employees have had a hand in fighting an outbreak of cryptosporidiosis, the illness confirmed to have sickened at least 89 county residents infected by the cryptosporidium parasite.

Of the 141 cases confirmed thus far in northeast Kansas, 96 are linked to the county’s outbreak.

The one-celled parasite attacks the digestive system and causes diarrhea, vomiting and stomach cramps. A person becomes infected after coming in contact with an infected surface, typically contact with another person, water or food.

Symptoms normally last two weeks or less, but the illness can be severe and even fatal for those with weakened immune systems.

In Lawrence, the parasite first was detected July 24, but widespread public notification didn’t come until a month later — too late for some area residents, but not for the two administrators whose governments finance the department’s operations.

“Do you ring the bell the first time you see something? The rearview mirror is, I guess, the cleanest mirror for folks,” Wildgen said. “But they’re the professionals. They clearly had the best professional advice. They were taking appropriate instructions and directions and advice from both the state and national people who deal with these cases more often than our local people do.

“The beauty of local government is that people feel free to give you both positive and negative critiques. And that’s not inappropriate at all. But from what I know about it, and how we’ve been informed and the commission has been informed, it was well done.”

Kay Kent, department administrator, told county commissioners last month that the department might have fallen short in only one task related to the outbreak: public relations.

Asked by commissioners what resources she could have used to better address the outbreak, Kent said that she could only think of one: having a dedicated public-relations professional on the job.

Commissioners said they would be willing to consider financing such a position, but the discussion likely wouldn’t occur until preparations for the 2005 county budget begin in the spring.