Teachers and staff in an affluent South Bay school district can skip the queue and get a COVID-19 vaccine – by pretending to be health workers – instructed by the Good Samaritan Hospital, according to an email received by San José Spotlight has.
Teachers still cannot get vaccinations in Santa Clara County. The province is at the beginning of phase 1B, but it has only been vaccinated for people aged 75 and older. Education and child care workers are lagging behind health workers and people aged 65 and over.
But teachers at the Los Gatos Union School District do not have to wait, their superintendent Paul Johnson told them. They can now get their vaccinations – at the behest of the hospital’s top leadership.
Johnson says in the email that the teachers should skip the queue is because they helped raise money for meals for health workers at Good Samaritan Hospital in the spring.
“The hospital’s general manager says we have access to the appointments here and have cleared LGUSD staff to sign up under the healthcare buttons,” Johnson wrote in the email to faculty and staff obtained by this news organization. “This is a wonderful gesture from our neighbors of Good Sam, and I encourage you to take advantage of this within the next few hours.”
Johnson said in the email that the plan was approved by the Good Samaritan chief operating officer. He said the hospital wants to offer ‘vaccines’ to the school district because they have not forgotten the ‘friendliness’ of the staff who raise money for meals for health workers.
In an interview with San José Spotlight, Johnson said it was not a pro-quo – and that the offer of Good Samaritan “is not related” to the money raised by the district.
“My understanding is that Good Sam was approved for the next level, so teachers did not jump in line,” Johnson said. “You’ll have to talk to Good Sam about hosting other districts outside of Los Gatos.”
Los Gatos does not yet offer personal tutoring. The district plans to open cases in Santa Clara County as soon as 25 cases per 100,000 residents. According to the state’s COVID-19 dashboard, the country averaged 67 cases per 100,000 this week.
Sarah Samwood, spokeswoman for Good Samaritan Hospital, said the hospital chose to offer vaccines to Los Gatos teachers because the hospital had extra appointments one day.
“We had some open time slots and welcomed 65 Los Gatos teachers into the clinic to receive their vaccinations, according to county guidelines,” Sherwood said. “Now, without additional open time slots, we must continue to vaccinate the 75+ population.”
Sherwood said the hospital is updating its website to make the vaccination schedule clearer.
“It is our full intention to vaccinate as many people as possible,” Sherwood said. “We hope to be able to vaccinate many more in the near future.”
According to the California Department of Public Health, provinces can award vaccine doses “on the assumption that immunization will be accepted by some, but not all, who are offered the vaccine, and then continue to offer vaccinations in progressive priority levels.”
For example, the department says that if a country makes maximum use of the vaccine for individuals in phase 1a, they should go to level 1 of phase 1b, while still offering vaccinations to those in higher priority groups.
“We are very grateful that Good Sam reached out to our district and offered to help our LGUSD staff (teachers and support staff) get vaccinated,” Johnson said. “Teachers are essential workers, and if we go back to personal teaching, we are grateful that they have access to vaccines to protect the students and the community.”
Teachers do not need to be vaccinated, Johnson added, and it is a personal choice. He said the district had only ‘received guidance from Good Sam on how to navigate their reporting system’.
The state began vaccinating residents 65 and older last week, but health care providers in Santa Clara County, including Kaiser, vaccinate people only 75 years and older due to a vaccine shortage.
Due to the shortage of vaccines, Good Samaritan reported to the country that it only vaccinates eligible health care personnel in the first phase of the state’s COVID-19 vaccination.
Santa Clara County receives approximately 30,000 vaccines per week from the state and federal governments. Land supervisors said it was not enough and agreed to send a letter to state health officials demanding more doses.
According to the Santa Clara County Vaccine Board, as of January 22, the Good Samaritan Hospital received 6,585 first and second doses of the vaccine and administered 3,674 doses.
The Santa Clara County Board of Education did not respond to a request for comment.
Public health officials in Santa Clara County say they are investigating the matter following an investigation by this news organization.
Contact Madelyn Reese at [email protected] and follow her @MadelynGReese