Madison County says another month needed to vaccinate health care workers
The vaccination of health care workers will carry on for an estimated four weeks in Madison County before the next round of eligible individuals can begin being vaccinated.
Madison County Health Department Director Toni Corona said Friday during a meeting of the county’s health board that an estimated 4,500 vaccines have been administered in the county.
“It’s going to take a little bit of time to get through this process,” Corona said. “The state is telling us we’ll likely be in the 1A stage for the next four weeks or so.”
Health care workers are part of the 1A round of individuals who are eligible for COVID-19 vaccinations.
Corona said vaccines for the deadly virus are “trickling” into the county and that the health department has no control over the speed in which the vaccines arrive, mirroring St. Clair County Health Department Emergency Response Coordinator Sam Bierman’s comments on the availability of the vaccine from earlier this week.
“A lot of this at this moment is not in our control. We don’t have freezers full of vaccines,” Corona said, adding that the vaccination of health care workers will take longer due to the large health care presence in the county.
“The health care worker piece is what we’ve been charged with right now, trying to coordinate and allocate the vaccines to our five area hospitals,” Corona said. “There are so many moving targets throughout the process. We expect as we continue on that the vaccination will continue to be allocated more regularly.”
Here are the early priority groups, according to the latest information from the Illinois Department of Public Health on the vaccine, which is subject to change:
- Phase 1A: Health care personnel and people who live or work in long-term care facilities such as nursing homes.
- Phase 1B: People who are 65 years old or older; firefighters; police officers; corrections officers; food and agricultural workers; U.S. Postal Service workers; manufacturing workers; grocery store workers; public transit workers; teachers; school support staff members; and daycare workers.
- Phase 1C: People who are 16 to 64 years old with high-risk medical conditions (conditions include obesity, diabetes, pulmonary disease, a heart condition like high blood pressure, kidney disease, cancer, an impaired immune system, sickle cell and pregnancy) and people who work in transportation and logistics, water and wastewater, food service, housing construction, finance, information technology, communications, energy, legal services, media, public safety and public health.
Corona said the vaccination of individuals living and working in long-term care centers is being handled by the federal government and is administered through Walgreens and CVS. That process has already begun, she noted.
Additionally, Corona said the county is working to develop a “ticker” to show how many vaccinations have been distributed in the county. She said it hoped the ticker will give the general public a better idea of when they might be eligible to be vaccinated.
The health department also began collecting resident’s contact information and details about their employment, age and whether they have health problems through a voluntary COVID-19 vaccination registration survey.
When a resident is eligible for the vaccine, based on the information shared in the survey, the health department says it will contact them to schedule a vaccination appointment.
This story was originally published January 8, 2021 at 12:10 PM.