Some people feel at risk or at the forefront of Maine’s vaccination plan

Birch Shambaugh and Fayth Preyer with their children, Wayland Shambaugh (6) and Cordelia Shambaugh (9), will be photographed outside their restaurant, Woodford Food & Beverage, in Portland on Wednesday. The restaurant has been dining indoors for almost a year. Shambaugh wrote a letter to government officials asking them to prioritize frontline workers for vaccinations. Brianna Soukup / Staff Photographer

Sherri Laux feels like the state of Maine has left her.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, at 57 she has five of the existing conditions that put her at greater risk for COVID-19, but she will not be eligible for a vaccine until at least April. the state’s primarily age approach to vaccination.

“I’m very scared,” Laux said. ‘I wanted this vaccine so badly, I registered to take part in a study. I have had two open heart surgeries, I have pulmonary hypertension, I have (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) and congestive heart failure. I may be 57 years old, but my body is not 57 years old. ”

Maine’s deployment of vaccines, which originally focused on a phased approach that would prioritize older Mainers and essential workers on the front lines, has changed several times. Last month, the state scrapped all priorities of dangerous workers outside of those in health care to first focus strictly on vaccinating older Mainers, but later bowed to the Biden government’s mandate to move teachers to the forefront.

Many Mainers, including those like Laux with pre-existing conditions, older adults who are still waiting their turn and hospitality workers at the front, feel left behind by a process that, while continuing to evolve, is anxious to receive one from the potentially life-saving vaccines.

DUCK DRAWER

Initially, the first phase, known as Phase 1A, included health care workers, paramedics, residents and nursing homes and staff. Phase 1B was 75 and older, as well as essential workers such as grocery stores, postal workers, teachers and police officers.

Later, in response to new federal guidelines, governments Janet Mills said she would update the plan to prioritize vaccinations for 65-year-olds and older and those with pre-existing conditions.

Last month, officials changed the plan again and announced a purely age-based system.

Mills and dr. Nirav Shah, director of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said the controversial decision to adopt an age-based system stems from scientific research showing that age is one of the strongest indicators of serious illness or death. of COVID-19. . More than 85 percent of COVID-19 deaths in Maine were under the age of 70, and 98 percent were over 50, according to CDC statistics.

At the time, Mills said the approach would benefit most people in Maine the fastest and that it was “the right one for our state.”

According to her, this would improve efficiency by confirming the logistical nightmares surrounding the competence of someone based on medical conditions or their work, while providing predictability during the pandemic.

Not long after, however, the plan was changed again after President Biden called on states to prioritize educators. Mills accepted the president’s prescription and announced last week that K-12 school staff and caregivers would be eligible for the vaccine, regardless of age.

The news was welcomed by educators who were frustrated with the age plans, although the state said the decision to prioritize teachers, its attempt to get those over 60 vaccinated if the federal vaccine supply does not increase.

According to the Maine CDC, more than 21 percent of the state’s residents received at least one dose of COVID-19, and more than 12 percent were completely vaccinated and had the one-vaccine Johnson & Johnson vaccine or two shots of the Vaccines against Modern or Pfizer.

MIXED OPINIONS

Aside from the addition of education workers, the state’s age-based approach remains.

The ages of 50 and older are expected to be eligible in April, in May 40 and older and in June 30 and older. Vaccines are estimated to be available in July for those 29 and younger.

Last week, however, Biden said vaccine production had risen to the point where all adults should have access to vaccines by the end of May.

Many supported the plan to vaccinate teachers and other school workers immediately.

Carolyn Kanicki, 64, has not yet received her vaccine and likes the age-based approach. As a retired teacher, the Rockland resident believes it is important to get students back in the classroom.

“I support it, even if it means being pushed back,” she said.

Not everyone is of the opinion.

“There was so much uncertainty that the addition of new uncertainty was a little discouraging,” Bruce Martel said of the late addition of school staff to the priority list.

Martel, who lives in Saco, said he generally supports the age-based approach and is not sure how vaccinating teachers will help reopen schools. It seems to him that if a student becomes infected, the same quarantine measures should still apply to keep children safe.

“It seems like more of the general population is (safe) making it possible (reopening),” he said.

Martel, 62, has not been vaccinated yet, but he is more concerned about people with pre-existing conditions who will have to keep waiting.

“Will this list change again?” he said. ‘I’m glad they change their minds if the situation warrants it. … There’s no point in never reflecting again, but I’m a little dissatisfied with this reconsideration. “

Laux agreed.

“I do not want to take a vaccine from anyone,” she said, “but I am just as dangerous as a 90-year-old in good health.”

If teachers are to be prioritized, she also wants people with existing conditions to be able to be integrated into the group.

‘It makes me a little angry because I know … things should be normal again, but people like us who have been in one apartment all winter, all summer, afraid to go out, unless absolutely necessary we need to return to a kind of normality, ‘she said. ‘I think we are one of the subpopulations that has been forgotten or pushed aside. I feel like my life is less important than I am a teacher’s. And it really hurts. ‘

BEHIND THE LINE

Birch Shambaugh and Fayth Preyer outside their restaurant, Woodford Food & Beverage in Portland. He says the right and responsible thing is to give hospitality workers the “reasonable protection of vaccination before they are sent to the field to help save our economy.” Brianna Soukup / Staff Photographer

Birch Shambaugh did not like it when Mills used the aging method and removed the priority for food service and grocery workers, but at least he understood it.

The change gave a “huge curveball” in his plans for the reopening of Woodford Food and Beverage, his restaurant on Forest Avenue in Portland, which will be closed for a full year for indoor dining from next week.

It was a hard pill to swallow, he said, but coupled with last week’s announcement that the state will ease travel and capacity constraints ahead of the tourism season – a decision largely hailed by the business community as a positive step – it was impossible to gauge.

‘How can Maine possibly ease constraints and try to prepare the pump of our critical tourism industry for the summer season, without providing the reasonable protection to allow those on the front line of the equation to confidently maintain their health and safety, their families and the communities in which they live? Shambaugh asked in a letter to government officials. “Without being able to vaccinate our staff and open the floodgates of exposure from other states, how can we return to normal operations?”

According to Maine’s hospitality workers, the right and responsible thing to do is ‘make reasonable protection against vaccinations before they are sent to the field to help save our economy’.

A year ago, Shambaugh’s restaurant employed about 25 people. The number was cut in half, but Shambaugh said he and his wife, Fayth Preyer, is proud that they were able to retain so much.

Their ages are spread across the spectrum, meaning that if they wait until all staff are vaccinated to fully reopen, as they hope, it may not happen until midsummer.

“It’s a challenging reality,” he said.

They opened outdoor meals in the summer and kept it going late in the fall and winter. As spring approached, they reopened it – ‘nothing we would consider a significant amount of business,’ ‘Shambaugh said, but’ it’s something. It’s a heartbeat, no matter how weak. ”

This is part of what makes the changes and the lack of protection so frustrating.

“We all want to do business again,” he said. “We’d rather not die for doing that.”

EVERYTHING

Holly Mansfield was relieved when she found out that her father, who is 76 and home, would eventually be eligible for the coronavirus vaccine.

Weeks later, he still could not make an appointment, and as more groups qualify, the competition for a coveted lock only increases.

“It was upsetting to me to read in the newspaper that it was opening up to people over 60,” Mansfield said. “Hearing that teachers are going to get it is even worse. Clearly, teachers need to be vaccinated and that it needs to be a priority, but my dad needs to get his too. ”

An Oxford County resident, her father has diabetes, and with an amputated leg he cannot drive.

Mansfield, his only daughter, lives in Massachusetts and has not been able to visit for fear of accidentally bringing COVID-19 home with him.

There is a woman who looks at him and sometimes drives him to appointments, she said, but Mansfield is not sure how careful the woman is, and it takes “just one person.”

“If they decide to prioritize this older age group, they really have to follow it,” she said. “It looks completely disorganized.”

When Northern Light Health opened its online COVID-19 vaccine registration portal last week, Susan Alimi was ready. As part of the newly eligible age group of more than 60 years, she was hoping to get one of the highly sought after spots, and she, her husband and her son in Massachusetts were all ready with their fingers on the refreshment button.

It was her son who finally booked the appointment, and Alimi, 66, said her son felt like he had won the lottery for her.

Alimi, from Fryeburg, was happy to make an appointment before all the slots were filled – even happier, as Mills announced just two days later that teachers and other teaching staff would also be eligible.

“If I could not discuss something, I would definitely feel that there would now be more competition with 40,000 teachers,” she said.

On the other hand, Alimi said she is happy for teachers, who also deserve a dose of vaccine, and acknowledges that it is difficult to determine who should be given preference.

“Teachers are happy, but there are all those who are just as important,” she said. “Everyone wants to be at the front of the line.”

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