“Ohio was invited by the CDC to participate in the scaling up of the federal program and we couldn’t be more excited,” the governor said. “We have lost a large number of people in our nursing homes, we can’t wait to be frank, get as many vaccinated as quickly as we can.”
The nursing homes were able to sign up with the different pharmacy companies. DeWine noted that some nursing homes did not sign up with any of the pharmacies, so the state will work on getting vaccines to those locations.
If a nursing home opts out of getting the vaccine, residents and staff will be able to get them later.
“It’s all a scheduling issue,” he said.
The announcement came on the same day Butler County remained at red Level 3 for the 16th straight week in the state’s coronavirus advisory system. No counties in southwest Ohio are purple Level 4, and only one in the region, Miami County, moved up to the “watch list” for possible advancement to Level 4 next week.
Butler County remains below state thresholds for new cases, emergency room visits for coronavirus symptoms and COVID-19 hospital admissions in the state advisory system. The county has reported 179 deaths, and the 22,948 cases reported Thursday were a 10.4% increase from the previous week.
The update Thursday came as the state continued distributing vaccines that began arriving on Monday. Dr. Bruce Vanderhoff, chief medical officer of the Ohio Department of Health, said he hopes that people seeing health care workers and experts getting the vaccine will help reassure those with concerns.
“I assure you they wouldn’t be lining up to get these shots if they didn’t think they were going to be safe and effective,” he said.”
Pfizer sent 98,475 doses of its vaccines to the state, and is expected to send another 123,000 next week. The Moderna vaccine, which is in the final steps of approval, is scheduled to ship 201,900 doses to Ohio next week.
By the end of 2020, Ohio is expecting to have more than 660,000 doses, according to DeWine.
Currently, vaccinations are prioritized for health care workers, residents and staff at congregate care settings and EMS responders. Congregate care facilities include nursing homes, assisted living center, veterans homes, psychiatric hospitals and group homes for those with developmental disabilities and mental illnesses.
For the next few weeks, the Pfizer vaccines will be sent to the long-term care facilities and the Moderna vaccines will go toward health care workers.
Ohio recorded more than 100 deaths attributed to coronavirus for the third day in a row Thursday, bringing the total to 7,894, according to the Ohio Department of Health.
Coronavirus patients account for approximately one-fifth of Ohio’s ICU beds, Vanderhoff said, which is making it harder for other patients who need the additional care to get into the unit.
“Not only are our ICUs very busy, they’re busy with critical volumes of COVID-19,” he said. “That’s a signal to all of us that we can’t let this thing get any worse. We can’t let our guard down for one minute.”
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