Chicago is expected to start giving residents 65 and older the coronavirus vaccine as early as next week, launching the next phase of the city’s rollout, health officials confirmed on Wednesday.
The Chicago Department of Public Health will allow residents over 65 to begin vaccinations next week, “but only with the remaining doses not claimed by health professionals and residents of long-term care facilities,” the department said.
“This would launch the next phase of the vaccination effort,” according to the CDPH.
While not the full Phase 1B initially planned for the city, it comes in the wake of a request from the Trump Administration, which this week asked states to vaccinate people aged 65 and over and those under 65 with underlying health problems. that put them at high risk.
Illinois Governor JB Pritzker is expected to announce this week when Illinois will enter Phase 1B of its coronavirus vaccine launch, although some areas may already be allowed to do so.
“I hope to make a formal announcement later this week, when Illinois
will move to Phase 1B across the state, “said Pritzker during his update on the coronavirus on Monday.” Of course, anyone in Phase 1A who chose not to be vaccinated will still be able to choose any subsequent round – this is about not leaving any vaccines on the shelves as we go. ”
On Monday, 587,900 total doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines were delivered to Illinois, 478,175 doses were sent to public and private healthcare providers outside Chicago and 109,725 doses were sent to providers in Chicago.
Illinois as a whole administered approximately 334,939 doses of vaccine on Sunday night.
“We are making important progress in Phase 1A and I appreciate the hard work of healthcare providers across the state to get through this phase as quickly as possible,” said Pritzker. “In some communities, they have even managed to substantially complete Phase 1A. IDPH is allowing any local health department in that position to move to the early stages of Phase 1B because we want to make sure that any available vaccine is administered quickly to priority groups. that we define. ”
Phase 1B is scheduled to focus on residents aged 65 and over and “essential frontline workers”, including first responders, educators such as teachers and support staff, childcare workers, grocery workers, postal service workers and much more. more.
The age requirement in Illinois is 10 years less than the initial recommendations of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, “in order to reduce mortality from COVID-19 and limit the spread of the community in black and brown communities,” said the governor .
Phase 1B will include about 3.2 million Illinois residents, according to the state.
Chicago health officials said they expected Phase 1B to begin in the city in February or March.
“A lot depends on how quickly the vaccine gets to us,” said Chicago Department of Public Health commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady. “We get about 32,000 doses of the first doses of vaccine a week now. Do you think about how many people there are over 65-370,000 – how many essential workers – hundreds of thousands, 150,000, just in education – are going to have to have a little patience But I would expect that we will probably start, you know, in the period from February to March, and then we will continue to vaccinate, you know, in the coming months. “