On Wednesday, an estimated 31,000 Clark County residents will be eligible for the COVID-19 vaccine as Washington begins the next phase of the vaccination.
While the early deployment was littered with long waits for vaccination, see dr. Alan Melnick, Clark County Public Health Officer, said the next phase was going smoothly and quickly due to an increase in vaccination.
“Given the amount of vaccine entering the community, I’m optimistic that not only are we ready for this new group of people, but I think we can get people vaccinated faster and more efficiently than before,” Melnick said. .
In January, vaccines became available to everyone over the age of 65 and people over the age of 50 living in multigenerational homes. But Clark County and most of Washington’s counties have struggled to vaccinate people quickly.
There was significantly more demand than supply. Clark County’s deployment is further hampered by the fact that Washington has cut short the allocation of the country’s vaccine, and the situation was rectified only a few weeks ago.
Rural data and anecdotal evidence suggest that the problems are decreasing, and that the availability of vaccines is increasing.
In less than a month, Clark County’s vaccine supply has more than quadrupled. During the first 11 weeks of the Washington vaccination, Clark County received an average of approximately 4,100 initial doses of the vaccine per week. In the latest vaccine award, the country received approximately 17,700 first doses.
The county has opened a vaccination yard at Tower Mall in Vancouver, in addition to the mass vaccination center that operates at the Clark County Event Center and Fairgrounds near Ridgefield.
The province administered vaccines to residents and staff for family homes. Medical providers, clinics and pharmacies are seeing an increase in their vaccine supply.
Perhaps the most promising sign of how much progress has been made and how much better this part of the implementation can go, how much Clark County Public Health has worked through its waiting list.
Just a few weeks ago, more than 30,000 people in the province waited to be referred to a medical provider for vaccination. As of Monday afternoon, the number had dropped to 291 people.
The big gains were made despite the fact that Washington added educators and child care workers as a suitable population two weeks ago.
Clark County added about 19,000 eligible people to those careers, but still made progress.
“The bottom line is that we recently added people and that we are still 291 on the waiting list,” Melnick said.
Health Department spokeswoman Shelby Anderson said in an email that government officials are confident of moving on to the next phase, which was recently moved up by a full week.
The state has vaccinated about 44,600 people a day in the past few weeks, compared to 26,000 people a day last month. More than 19 percent of Washingtonians received a first dose of vaccine, according to Anderson, and 11 percent were fully vaccinated.
At the end of February, 8.26 percent of Clark County’s population had received one dose and only 3.47 percent of the population had been fully vaccinated. As of Monday afternoon, those numbers had jumped to 14.39 percent and 6.89 percent, respectively.
Anderson said Washington receives 320,000 doses of vaccine throughout.
According to a three-week forecast by the state, Washington should receive more than 341,000 doses of vaccine in the week of March 28th.
Anderson did say that if you are eligible but still not vaccinated, it would be a good idea to book an appointment before the next phase opens Wednesday.
“The Department of Health and our partners across the state have worked hard to ensure we have the infrastructure to expand the vaccine administration as the allocation increases,” Anderson said. “We hope people no longer have to wait to receive vaccines when they are eligible.”