| Louisville Courier Journal
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Flooded with requests for COVID-19 vaccines for people aged 70 and older, all three of Louisville’s hospital systems were forced to suspend new appointments – just three days after they began planning them.
Meanwhile, a waiting list for people looking for appointments has grown to about 40,000 since Friday, Dr. Jason Smith, chief medical officer of the University of Louisville Health, said Monday in a press release.
Smith said demand for the vaccine is simply increasing supply.
“It’s going to take a while to get through it all,” Smith said.
He said the three major hospital systems in the area – U or L, Baptist Health and Norton Healthcare – are trying to accommodate people on the waiting list managed by the Louisville Department of Health.
Smith said the three systems are obscuring names on the waiting list and that they will come into contact with people as limited vaccine supplies become available.
“We try to open new appointments every week, depending on what our vaccine supply is,” Smith said. “The vaccine supply was quite volatile. We could get 1,000 doses one week and three or four thousand the next week.”
Answer your questions: When can I get a COVID-19 vaccine in Kentucky?
People who cannot get appointments are encouraged to keep trying.
Jim Kinsman, 85, a retired investment manager in Louisville, said he tried not to get appointments through all three hospitals for himself and his wife (86) – an experience he said was very frustrating.
“Going online and getting these sites to say ‘come later’ seems so inefficient,” he said. “It’s like going online and trying to get tickets for a concert.”
Smith asked that people continue to try to book appointments via U or L Health’s website and not call the University Hospital.
“Do not call,” he said, adding that U or L received “thousands of calls” about the vaccine.
Supplies of vaccines to states are designated by the federal government, and Smith said it is unclear how much is available and whether the stock is low, as has been said in some national news reports.
Governor Andy Beshear announced earlier this month that he wants to accelerate the rate of vaccinations in Kentucky, focusing on the most at-risk people and school staff to get children in grades K-12 back into the person’s classes.
All three Louisville hospital systems announced Friday that they will begin offering vaccinations to people over the age of 70, in addition to their own health workers. They were quickly overwhelmed with requests.
Norton’s website says due to high demand, ‘schedules are currently closed’. Spokeswoman Maggie Roetker said Norton will add more appointments as more vaccine becomes available and urges people to continue checking the site.
Background: Norton, U or L, Baptist Deploy Vaccines for People 70 and Older
Baptist’s website also reports that there are no available appointments in Louisville. Baptist spokeswoman Julie Garrison said the hospital was flooded with requests and hoped to be able to offer more appointments soon.
Smith said U or L hope to offer more appointments in the coming weeks, but that the varying supply of vaccine approved by the federal government makes it impossible to give details on when people can expect it.
“Ideally, we would have enough vaccine to give thousands and thousands of doses a day, and that’s just not the reality of what we see in terms of vaccine distribution,” he said.
Beshear announced earlier this month that anyone aged 70 or over would be eligible for the Phase 1B vaccine of state guidelines for the delivery of limited doses, along with first responders, such as police and firefighters, and school staff.
The first doses in phase 1A are administered to frontline health workers, residents and nursing home staff.
Those 70 years of age or older are preferred for the vaccine because they are at greatest risk for hospitalization and death from COVID-19.
According to the state Department of Health and Family Services, Kentucky has about 500,000 people who are 70 years or older.
Smith said he did not blame the government.
“Overall, they did a pretty good job of bringing it out to states, and the states did a pretty good job of getting it to the hospitals,” Smith said.
More coverage: Should pregnant women take the COVID-19 vaccine?
Biden: current explosion of an unfortunate vaccine
President-elect Joe Biden called the current deployment of the coronavirus vaccine a “gloomy failure” as he emphasized his $ 1.9 billion plan to fight the pandemic and provide additional relief. (January 15)
AP
But President-elect Joe Biden has criticized the Trump administration’s attempt to distribute vaccines as a failure, saying its goal is for Americans to get 100 million COVID-19 shots in the first 100 days of his administration. .
To do so, Biden promises to add clinics, strengthen public health staff and enact a production period law to ensure adequate vaccine supply.
To date, approximately 10.6 million Americans have received the first dose of two-syringe injection required by both manufacturers Moderna and Pfizer / BioNtech, which has been approved for emergency use.
In Kentucky, with about 4.4 million residents, 213,567 doses of vaccine were administered as of Monday, according to the state’s COVID-19 website.
Kinsman said he wishes someone at the state or local level could design a system in which people could discuss appointments as available, rather than be told to keep trying.
“Maybe they can do something to make it a little easier for us,” he said. “I would like to know that I have a place in the queue.”
People who currently want to make an appointment with the vaccine can henceforth try to do so through the three hospital websites.
People over the age of 70 who already have an online patient card through Norton will receive an instant message to enable them to get vaccinated. Others can go to nortonhealthcare.com/campaigns/covid-19-vaccine-tier1b or call 502-861-4499 to schedule.
Go to uoflhealth.org/louisville-covid-19-vaccinations to discuss your vaccination through U or L Health.
Baptist Health has an online registration portal at baptisthealth.com/vaccine/schedule-now.
Last numbers: Less than 2,000 cases of coronavirus were reported Monday
Contact Deborah Yetter at [email protected] or 502-582-4228. Find her on Twitter at @d_yetter.