Thousands of new first-dose COVID-19 vaccination appointments will open Wednesday afternoon for Cook County residents.
Meanwhile, Chicago’s coronavirus positivity is the lowest since the pandemic, the city’s top doctor announced on Tuesday.
Here are the latest COVID headlines from across the state:
Phase 1B Plus: All We Know About Illinois Expansion in Phase 1B COVID Vaccinations
Phase 1B in Illinois is about to change as the state qualifies for a much larger group of residents.
Known as Phase 1B Plus, the current phase of rolling out COVID vaccines in Illinois will soon extend to people with certain high-risk medical conditions and comorbidities.
But that will not be the case everywhere.
Click here for everything we know so far about the extended Phase 1B, which begins Thursday.
Coronavirus in Illinois: 2,022 new cases, 44 additional deaths, nearly 56,000 vaccinations
Illinois health officials reported 2,022 new cases of coronavirus on Wednesday, along with 44 additional deaths attributed to the virus.
According to the latest data from the Illinois Department of Public Health, Wednesday’s new cases bring the state to 1,179,342 cases of the virus since the pandemic began last year. A total of 20,374 deaths were reported due to the virus.
The seven-day positivity rate declined Wednesday, with 2.6% of all tests returning positive, according to IDPH. The positivity rate on individuals tested dropped slightly to 2.8%.
Over the past 24 hours, state laboratories received 82,976 test samples, with a total of 17,804,537 tests performed during the pandemic.
Hospitalizations in the state are still declining, with 1511 patients currently being admitted to the hospital due to COVID-19. Of the patients, 338 are currently in intensive care units, while 172 are in ventilators.
According to IDPH data, a total of 55,947 doses of the vaccine were administered in Illinois on Tuesday, with the seven-day rolling average now standing at 58,141 doses per day.
A total of 2,584,125 doses of vaccines were delivered to suppliers in Illinois, along with 445,200 doses delivered to pharmacies as part of a federal program to vaccinate staff and residents at long-term care facilities. Of the 3 million doses, 2310,929 vaccines were administered from midnight in Illinois, including 291,273 for long-term care facilities.
Thousands of new COVID-19 vaccine appointments open in Cook County on Wednesday
Thousands of new first-dose COVID-19 vaccination appointments will open Wednesday afternoon for Cook County residents.
A total of 5,000 appointments will be opened at Triton College and South Suburban College later this week for individuals eligible under Phases 1A and 1B, according to a statement from Cook County Health.
Appointments can be made at vaccine.cookcountyil.gov. Those who do not have internet access and who need help can call 833-308-1988 from 07:00 to 19:00 from Monday to Friday.
Read more here.
Chicago prioritizes COVID access to vaccines for homeless people in the residential area
State health officials are working to ensure equitable access to the coronavirus vaccine, and part of the strategy is to prioritize vaccinations for homeless Chicago residents.
“I’m so glad I got my second dose of COVID vaccine,” said Constance Foster, a resident of the Pacific Garden Mission in Chicago.
Foster was one of 170 residents and staff at the mission who received their second doses of the vaccine on Tuesday, as part of the city’s effort to ensure that individuals living and working in the community area have access to treatment as soon as possible. can get.
According to dr. Allison Arwady, the commissioner of the Chicago Department of Public Health, gave more than 2,000 doses of the vaccine to homeless shelters during the pandemic, a significant portion of the more than half a million doses of COVID vaccine given during the entire pandemic. has been administered. City. “Long-term care facilities or homeless shelters where we are, where we have seen many things disproportionately, we know it is difficult to always have all the distance and all the things in place,” she said.
“We are so grateful to CDPH for providing these vaccines. Giving priority to people who are homeless and prioritizing people in black and colored communities is critical, ”said Dr. Alex Porte, a doctor at the mission, added.
CDPH says that part of its effort to ensure equitable access to the vaccine ensures that it prioritizes the doses of vaccines for communities that do not have primary care and health insurance.
Read more here.
Are COVID vaccinations free? Top Healthcare Official Addresses About Chicago
Health officials in Chicago remind residents that coronavirus vaccination itself is free, but the city is also evaluating what it can do if clinicians pass on administrative costs to patients when administering treatment.
Dr. Allison Arwady, commissioner of the Chicago Department of Public Health, told a news conference Tuesday afternoon that patients do not have to pay for the vaccine themselves because of the agreements between the federal government and companies and clinics in charge of administering the vaccine. the vaccine.
“I want people in Chicago to hear that they should not be billed directly for receiving a COVID vaccine unless they receive other services related to the visit,” she said.
According to Arwady, the vaccine itself is delivered free of charge to clinics through agreements between pharmaceutical companies and the federal government. She did warn residents that there may be other small costs incurred if a patient receives other treatment or services during the visit to receive the vaccine.
‘Where people see a supplier for something that goes beyond the COVID vaccine, such as (if they) go to their primary care doctor and regularly check in and do laboratory work, and then get the COVID vaccine as part of their visit, you still pay for that visit, ”she said. “It gets complicated relatively quickly.”
Arwady says the issue of additional charges related to the vaccine has been most prevalent when patients visit urgent care clinics and other similar facilities for treatment, but that the CDPH is investigating these issues.
Chicago’s best doctor shares top concern with emerging COVID variants
Chicago’s top doctor said she’s less worried about the current variants being monitored in the U.S. because she has a greater concern that she’s monitoring.
The US monitors new variants of the coronavirus emerging in the US, some of which have already been identified in cases in Illinois.
The biggest concern in the city, Arwady said, was the variant first reported from the UK, which she said had been detected in at least a dozen cases in the city, but more across the state.
“This is the one that is considered more contagious, which is more contagious, but the vaccine remains very protective against it, as we saw in this trial here,” Arwady said during a Facebook Live Tuesday.
Apart from the British variant, others that originated in South Africa and Brazil also appeared in the USA, which expressed concern.
The Illinois Department of Public Health revealed earlier this month that the first case of the coronavirus variant B.1.351, first identified in South Africa, had been found in the state.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, current variants spread more easily and faster than other variants.
But experts believe the current vaccines in the US offer at least some protection against these variants, although Arwady has noted that one of the three strains poses a greater risk than others, and that is the variant from South Africa.
“It has been shown that one, especially some of the vaccines, has reduced the effectiveness against the strain,” Arwady said. “The Pfizer and the Moderna therefore remain protective against the strain, but not as protective, as to ward off a little. And then there is the AstraZeneca vaccine, which we do not yet have here, but it was the one that they intended to use in South Africa was really not very protective, it was less than 50% protective, and so South Africa actually stopped its vaccination campaign because they did not want to vaccinate people with a vaccine that is not protective “was not against the obstacle. That’s the kind of thing that worries me the most.”
Read more here.
COVID-19 Positivity rate hits record low since pandemic begins, says Chicago top doctor
The positive rate of coronavirus in Chicago is the lowest since the pandemic began, the city’s leading doctor announced on Tuesday.
In a Facebook Live event, dr. Allison Arwady, commissioner of the Chicago Department of Public Health, announced that the city’s positivity rate is 3.2%, the lowest since the coronavirus pandemic arrived in Chicago.
The announcement comes days after the city achieved the second lowest positivity rate since the pandemic began Friday, where 3.5% of the tests returned were positive COVID-19 results, Arwady said.
Arwady noted that Chicago’s positivity rate fell below 4% during the summer, but never to the level the city recorded on Tuesday.
COVID-19 testing has declined in the city, but Arwady said this measure will not lower the positivity rate. On the contrary, she explained that the positivity rate would usually increase if the test dropped.
Chicago’s average 257 new COVID-19 cases a day, Arwady said. This is less than the more than 3,000 cases per day recorded at the peak of the virus. On Friday, Chicago recorded 323 new cases of coronavirus daily.
According to the Chicago guidelines, the city’s daily number of people is also lower than a ‘high-risk area’, which enables the city to resume higher-capacity indoor dining.
These locations do not join Illinois to expand the suitability for Phase 1B. Here’s why
Several suburbs in Chicago and Chicago itself will not join Illinois to expand the list of people eligible for COVID-19 vaccines in Phase 1B of the vaccination.
Chicago was among the first to announce that they would not join the state. They were later joined by suburban Cook County and DuPage County, who announced a similar decision.
“We are not ready yet,” said Dr. Chicago Public Health Secretary Allison Arwady said in a Facebook Live video on Tuesday. The city of Chicago, Cook County, Evanston, DuPage County, Stickney – there could be others. Everyone said we just could not go on at some point. ‘
The DuPage County Department of Health said in a statement that it could not extend the addition to the vaccine extension.
Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle in a joint statement with Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot reiterated the allegations, saying: “We are not provided with sufficient doses to enable us to be eligible in these phases. “
According to Arwady, more than 950,000 Chicago residents would be eligible if the city expanded Phase 1B under state guidelines.
“We can not add a million people to the nearly one million people, including the 1A, who are already competing for the existing doses,” she said. “It will make everyone more frustrated. If we have more vaccine, we will definitely open up and go from there.”
In a note to residents, Evanston said he did not expect to extend the Phase 1B allocation “due to the large number of individuals 65 years and older in Evanston who are currently eligible for vaccines as part of Phase 1b, and the limited supply of vaccines available to date. “
Read more here.