Photo by: Associated Press
A nurse administers a COVID-19 vaccination at a distribution center Thursday, January 21, 2021, at North Side Baptist Church in Weatherford, Texas. (Yffy Yossifor / Star-Telegram via AP)
Douglas County residents can now complete a form to indicate their level of interest in receiving a COVID-19 vaccine, what stage they believe they are qualified for and how they would like to be notified when vaccines are available.
The form can be completed online at dgcoks.org/vaccineinterestform.
The completion of the survey will not create an appointment or reserve a vaccine, a health department press release said on Friday, but it will help planners streamline the notification and scheduling process, identifying which stage people qualify for.
This health department announcement came after some residents expressed concern that the Phase 2 vaccine application process was competitive and unfair. Douglas County currently has a Phase 2 vaccination clinic set for January 29 for people aged 65 and over, but all 500 appointments were completed within 25 minutes of the alert. When the county announced an additional 460 appointment times for January 29, those vacancies were filled in 13 minutes.
“With an extremely limited supply of the vaccine now, we find it frustrating for people who have failed to make an appointment for themselves or their loved ones,” said business systems analyst Charlie Bryan, president of the Vaccination Planning Unit under Command Unified. “This new form will help us to identify at what stage people would qualify, so that we can communicate effectively with them as doses become available to their priority group. We believe this will help with the notification process going forward. “
Any resident who needs help filling out the form can contact the Senior Resource Center at 785-842-0543 and leave a message. The team will return calls during business hours in the order that calls are received.
Condado observes 27 new cases
Douglas County reported 7,818 cases of COVID-19 on Friday, an increase of 27 cases since Thursday.
In Douglas County, 6,816 of the 7,818 cases are inactive or beyond the infectious period, according to Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health, that is, 1,002 cases are active.
The county recorded an average of 46 new cases per day for the past 14 days, according to a 14-day moving average chart updated during the week by the health department. The current average of 46.14 new cases per day is below a maximum of 80 cases per day in mid-November and above a recent low of around 45 cases per day in mid-December.
Douglas County has a 14-day COVID-19 incidence rate of 537.04 per 100,000 people. Last Friday, 4,129 doses of COVID-19 vaccines were administered at LMH Health, Heartland, the health department, Haskell Indian Health Center and long-term care facilities. This week, 4,644 doses were administered in these same facilities. Douglas County has received 11,239 doses of vaccine so far.
Twelve patients at Lawrence’s hospital had COVID-19 on Friday, two fewer than on Thursday. To date, 36 Douglas County residents have died of COVID-19.