An influential group of California health experts is currently holding on to Governor Gavid Newsom’s decision to make age the primary criterion for receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. The decision announced today dismayed advocates who hoped the group would recommend moving people with disabilities and those with chronic medical conditions to the front of the line alongside people aged 65 and over.
“My disability makes my immune system very weak. When I get a cold, it hits my lungs and I have trouble breathing, ”wrote Dina Garcia, of Chatsworth, before Wednesday’s meeting of the state’s vaccine community advisory committee, where the decision was announced. “My doctor told me that if I get COVID, I may not survive. My assistant (personal assistant) already told me that I would not get the vaccine. I am extremely concerned about not surviving this pandemic. “
The external panel of experts convened by state officials to set California’s vaccine priorities made its decision after analyzing research showing that older people are much more likely to be hospitalized or die of COVID-19 than even people with disabilities or medical conditions. significant, said Dr. Oliver Brooks, the group’s leader.
People with disabilities and those with chronic conditions would be vaccinated after people over 65 and some groups of essential workers, such as teachers and rural workers – but even before the general public – if state officials adopted the panel’s recommendations. Disability advocates are lobbying Newsom to move the vaccine order, and he could overturn the group’s proposal.
Dr. Erica Pan, a state epidemiologist, said the group also acknowledged that although 8.5 million people are currently eligible for the vaccine, California has received only about 6.7 million doses.
“These are extremely challenging decisions that we are making,” said Pan.
In mid-January, California abruptly changed to aging as the primary eligibility criterion to simplify and accelerate a chaotic and widely criticized vaccine release. The decision alarmed advocates for people with disabilities, said Christina Mills, executive director of the California Foundation for Independent Living Centers.
They expected state officials this week to announce a plan to put the disabled at the top of the list of priorities, but that statement never came.
Instead, Dr. Mark Ghaly, the state’s chief health officer, said on Tuesday that he was aware of the community’s concerns and talked about “starting to spur around an opportunity that we will announce later.”
The comment did not please Mills, who lives with a genetic bone disease known as osteogenesis imperfecta and uses a wheelchair and help from personal assistants to live on his own.
“Honestly, it pisses me off even more,” Mills told CalMatters. “It’s like, what are we waiting for? The state has not yet figured out how to operationalize the vaccine for people like us. ”
The Federal Centers for Disease Control recommended that people with underlying medical conditions, such as diabetes, cancer, cystic fibrosis and obesity, receive the vaccine along with those aged 65 to 74, after people aged 75 or over and line workers. facing. But states can adjust these priorities.
For example, Colorado vaccines people with two or more high-risk medical conditions alongside people over 65. Florida is vaccinating people considered by hospital providers to be “extremely vulnerable” to COVID-19, along with people 65 and older. In contrast, Kansas placed people under the age of 65 in high-risk conditions behind people aged 65 and over, prisoners and those living in other “congregated settings” that are not nursing homes.
But California has changed its priority to 65+ based on studies showing that age is a greater indicator of death than disability. (Some research suggests that certain conditions, such as Down syndrome, contribute to a higher risk of dying from COVID-19 than the average person, but the research is mixed.)
Even when vaccines become more widely available, Mills and other advocates say that immunizing people with disabilities and chronic medical conditions will be challenging. The transit services available for people with disabilities do not wait for hours at a mass vaccination clinic. Some people are stuck at home. Some will not be able to stay in long lines or may need an escort.
To address concerns that people may try to skip the line alleging deficiencies they do not have, some advocates suggest that the state prioritize only certain groups, such as those receiving Home Support Services, a state program for the elderly, blind or disabled serving about 600,000 Californians. Other advocates, however, say that people should be able to “identify” themselves to speed up and simplify vaccinations. The state is creating another committee to address these details.
As California’s COVID-19 cases continue to decline after the peak of the holiday, nearly 3.8 million people received their first or second dose of vaccine, less than 10% of the population. After lagging most other states in vaccination rates, California now ranks 29th nationally, Pan said today.
Vaccination of residents and health care workers is expected to be completed by the end of February, and those in assisted living facilities by the end of March, Pan said.
The supply of vaccines remains limited, however, and some counties report that they do not have enough to expand immunization to key teachers and staff who – in theory – could be immunized with Californians 65 and older.
While health officials continue to make difficult decisions about which people will receive the next vaccine in the midst of so much need, Hector M. Ramirez, who virtually attended the committee meeting, commented on the meeting’s online chat:
“As a Native American who is also Latin and disabled, I have no idea what equity means anymore. I know what pain is like now more than ever. I lost four family members. And the fear (I) will lose more. “
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