Maine health officials reported 201 new cases of COVID-19 and one death on Monday, while the state continues to see significantly fewer new infections caused by the viral disease.
The continuous average of new cases in the previous week was 269 on Monday, compared to a seven-day average of 357 new cases on February 1 and a peak of 626 on January 15, according to the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Cases are declining in Maine and across the country after a post-holiday spike, although the disease continues to claim additional lives – particularly among those over 70 in Maine – and there are concerns about the appearance of new, more communicable variants of the COVID-19 in the states.
The pace of vaccinations in Maine has also accelerated and is expected to increase this week due, in part, to a modest increase in federal government vaccine shipments and the establishment of several mass vaccination sites in the state.
Maine CDC expects to receive enough first doses this week to vaccinate an additional 21,475 people, an increase of 1,100 doses, but still less than half the estimated volume needed to inoculate most of the state’s population by summer. Second doses are sent to the states in which they are to be administered, between three and four weeks after the first dose, depending on the manufacturer.
On Monday morning, health care providers administered 142,325 first doses of the vaccine to people in Maine, along with 52,920 second doses, for a total of 195,245 injections administered. More than 10.5% of Maine’s population had received at least one dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine by Sunday, with 38% of those vaccines administered to individuals aged 70 and over.
To date, the Maine CDC has reported a total of 41,419 confirmed or probable cases of COVID-19 since the disease was detected in Maine 11 months ago, along with 636 deaths. Individuals aged 70 and over – the main focus of the state’s current vaccination phase – account for only 12% of people who contracted COVID-19 in Maine, but almost 86% of deaths.
Maine is currently among the top 10 states in terms of the percentage of the population that received at least one dose of the vaccine, according to Bloomberg’s tracking. At the current rate, state officials said they would expect to vaccinate two-thirds of people aged 70 and over by early March, allowing eligibility to expand to individuals aged 65 to 69.
But vaccination rates in Maine and across the country have been slower than desired because of limited federal government supplies. And many older Maine residents are having to navigate a messy maze of different vaccine registration and marking systems because of the lack of a centralized system across the state.
Vaccination in nursing homes, assisted living centers and independent living facilities in Maine is also taking longer than anticipated, in part because of complications in the federal partnership with pharmaceutical retail giants CVS and Walgreens. Many independent living facilities are struggling to secure vaccines for their residents after the federal government abruptly withdrew those facilities from the federal program because of limited doses.
There are now two mass vaccination sites open in Maine with more in the works, although limited supply of doses to the state means that the two existing sites are still operating well below their potential capacity. MaineHealth opened a high-volume clinic on the old Scarborough Downs harness race track last week, while Northern Light Health opened a clinic at the Cross Insurance Center in Bangor.
This story will be updated.
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