Oregon will accelerate its COVID-19 vaccination schedule to make all adult residents aged 16 and over eligible for an injection by May 1, Governor Kate Brown announced on Friday. That is the date when President Joe Biden said he wants all American adults to be able to get a vaccine.
Brown and state health officials previously declined the president’s announcement, applauding his ambition and, at the same time, hesitating to promise people vaccines before they materialize. The previous federal administration, under former President Donald Trump, made many empty promises in this regard.
Oregon Health Authority Director Patrick Allen told OPB’s “Think Out Loud” (listen below) on Wednesday that the federal government now appears to have ordered enough vaccine doses for the agency to update its schedule more safely .
“It makes us a little nervous,” said Allen. “To be fair, this administration has generally been very good about what has ensured that we will be able to see.”
The state will also loosen control over the vaccine schedule a little. Counties that finish vaccinating eligible groups more quickly will be allowed to move on to the next group at their own pace. The governor’s office also said that migrant and seasonal rural workers will also be eligible as of Monday in the counties where they have already started to work.
Nurse Madison Freenling speaks to a patient after giving a COVID-19 vaccine on Sunday, January 10, 2021 in Portland, Oregon, at a drive-thru vaccination clinic. The clinic was a partnership between SEIU and Oregon Health & Science University, with the goal of vaccinating Oregon’s 32,000 home health professionals and their patients.
Kristyna Wentz-Graff / OPB
The rest of the timeline is as follows:
- March 29th: adults between 45 and 64 years old with underlying health problems; pregnant women aged 16 or over; migrant and seasonal agricultural workers; seafood and agricultural workers; food processing workers; homeless people; people displaced by forest fires; firefighters in the wild; people in homes for low-income seniors, combined care units or independent living
- April 19th: frontline workers who meet the definition of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, people in multi-generational housing and adults aged 16 to 44 with underlying health problems
- 1st May: all adults aged 16 and over
Oregon’s revised schedule would allow all adults to start looking for appointments on Biden’s target date. Inoculating all these people will take much longer.
Sometime this summer, Oregon will face what could be the next big hurdle for vaccines: too many vaccines and too few arms to put them on.
This is a developing story. Stay tuned for updates.