COLOMBIA – South Carolina seniors adamant that they should be eligible for a COVID-19 vaccine welcomed Monday’s announcement that anyone 70 and older could soon make an appointment.
It was high time, they said with smiles, after days pointing to lawmakers and reporters that senior citizens in other states were already lining up to take their chance. After all, they observed correctly and repeatedly, they are in the age group most at risk of dying from the disease.
But whatever the frustrations suppressed by the announcement, they came back into effect as soon as they really tried to get an interview, when they officially became eligible on Wednesday.
The two-step process of checking for green dots on the map on a state website – indicating where appointments are available – and contacting the provider to sign up seemed awkward even before the site went live.
State health officials warned on Tuesday that available places would be limited. If there’s a red square next to a healthcare provider, don’t even bother to call, said Marshall Taylor, acting director of the state’s Department of Health and Environmental Control.
What they didn’t say – and probably didn’t know – is that even a green dot could be an exercise in futility for newly eligible seniors. DHEC left the decision to make appointments without any dose in stock.
The only provider in the Charleston region with a green dot on Wednesday was Medical University of South Carolina. But he was offering consultations weeks, even months in advance.
And navigating the hospitals’ online enrollment system required much more than two steps. That alone was not an easy task for South Carolina’s savvy residents.
For many, relief from being eligible turned to anger at the prospect of waiting several months for the immunity that the double vaccine offers from a disease that killed nearly 6,000 South Carolina residents – 71% of them aged 70 or older.
This chart divides South Carolina’s COVID-19 deaths by age group, as per the latest DHEC update, Friday, January 15, 2021. The chart is updated online every Tuesday and Friday.
Why the elderly are still waiting
Concerned South Carolinians suspected misconduct due to vaccine delays.
But, while there are many understandable criticisms about the slow implementation of vaccines so far – and many issues remaining – the inability of the elderly to get an injection immediately after they become eligible comes down to math.
As of Friday, South Carolina had received 236,250 doses of COVID-19 vaccines since mid-December for people eligible outside long-term care facilities, where vaccines are treated under a federal contract with CVS and Walgreens.
Hospitals – which have been the only place where people can get a Pfizer injection – distributed 134,580 of those doses on Friday morning. And 140,369 additional people made an appointment for an injection, according to DHEC data.
This means that each dose that South Carolina received – in addition to nearly 38,700 doses of future shipments – was in someone’s arm or was already booked.
When the elderly became eligible, the hospitals’ existing supply was almost all approved by health professionals. Although they were eligible from the start of implementation, they did not make massive commitments until Governor Henry McMaster issued a January 15 deadline for them to do so.
The list of eligible workers in Phase 1A, who had the first rights before the elderly who were not on long-term treatment, is long, covering about 267,000 employees of all stripes in the health sector. Basically, if you work in healthcare, you qualify first.
Some vulnerable southern Carolinians questioned why apparently low-risk workers, such as young medical graduate students who do not work with COVID-19 patients, would be allowed to queue before the elderly.
DHEC has allowed hospitals to decide who qualifies in their system. But Dr. Brannon Traxler, director of public health at DHEC, said on Friday that all work in a health facility is at high risk.
“When you are in a hospital all day, you are at risk,” she told The Post and Courier, setting the example of people who clean patients’ rooms. “There are people who, because of their position, you may not think of health professionals, but because they are working in a high-risk environment, they are health professionals.”
Some also questioned why South Carolina made hospitals the only place where skilled workers for initial shipments – which include coaches, chiropractors, dentists, funeral directors and optometrists – could get an injection.
Many people who did not work directly at a hospital found it difficult to get an appointment, even after McMaster set his deadline.
Apparently, even hospital administrators were confused and had to be told two weeks ago that they should offer injections to these people.
Taylor told state senators on Tuesday that hospitals were designated in part because the initial federal guidance was that Phase 1A would be limited to employees within hospitals and that other health professionals would be in the next phase. That is why DHEC initially referred to the first phase as frontline hospital workers and residents and long-term care staff.
But the federal orientation changed a week before launch began.
The estimated population for Phase 1A jumped from 184,000 to 353,000 people, when all other areas of health were added, Taylor said.
Accelerating the launch
Still, there is hope that newly eligible elders will be given a chance earlier than it seemed in the early days.
On Friday, the state’s largest health care system, Prisma, announced that it was opening mass vaccination, drive-thru posts in Columbia and Greenville, starting on Monday, specifically for the public aged 70 and over. . Likewise, Roper announced that it was opening a drive-thru site at the North Charleston Coliseum, starting on Wednesday.
Commitments are still required. But mass vaccination sites that operate daily at least indicate the possibility of an injection before spring.
Hospitals are allocating part of their future allocations for drive-thrus. Federal remittances arrive weekly, usually on Mondays, said Traxler.
To increase vaccination COVID-19, SC expands who can administer vaccines
Administrators at Prisma and the Medical University of South Carolina have told senators they hope to increase 10,000 injections per day by February – three to four times the current rate – thanks in part to expanding the state of who can administer.
Elderly people who made an appointment weeks or months in advance should try to reschedule.
“We’re encouraging people to double check if they’re not happy with the schedule,” Dr. Danielle Scheurer, director of quality at MUSC, said on Friday. “My advice would be to check the website for new vacancies. They are literally opening every day.”
Big companies with offices in South Carolina will also be online next week: CVS, Walgreens, Walmart, Harris Teeter, Kroger and Publix. Not all pharmacies offer injections immediately. Watch for ads and check the map for new green dots that appear, Traxler said on Friday.
Still, even if South Carolina gets available injections of eligible weapons more quickly, how quickly people can get one still depends on federal remittances.
In the near future, South Carolina expects about 63,000 to 64,000 doses to arrive weekly.
At this rate, considering that the population of 70 and over in South Carolina is 630,000, it could take 10 weeks just to vaccinate this age group. The hope lies in the larger federal shipments and the likelihood that vaccines from other companies will be authorized for widespread use, which could happen in the coming weeks.
But for people aged 65 to 69 and people with pre-existing illnesses that are inflexible, they should also be eligible, unfortunately, they can wait for a while, regardless of whether South Carolina changes its rules or not.