Health officials informed the Montgomery County Council on Tuesday about the county’s vaccination plan so far.
A Montgomery County legislature in Maryland is pushing the county to start vaccinating older adults, who are recently qualified for COVID-19 vaccines under accelerated state guidelines, as of this week.
But county health officials say they are still vaccinating thousands of health workers, and the state is not providing enough doses of the vaccines to start giving injections into the arms of people 75 and older in large numbers soon.
According to Phase 1b of the Maryland coronavirus vaccination plan, these older adults were eligible to receive vaccines starting on Monday. Other jurisdictions, including neighboring Prince George County, are advancing vaccines for people 75 and older.
Speaking during a Montgomery County Council hearing on Tuesday, At-Large Council member Hans Riemer pushed for the expansion of vaccinations according to state guidelines and said that seniors in Montgomery County “need to feel that are a priority ”.
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Earl Stoddard, director of the county’s Office of Emergency Management and Homeland Security, said the county still has between 15,000 and 20,000 health professionals, such as dentists and pharmacists, to be vaccinated.
Moving the elderly to the front of the line would also put the county in a dilemma.
“If we’re going to vaccinate 75-year-olds this week, it will basically be … take the doses from healthcare professionals and distribute them to the population aged 75 and over,” Stoddard told board members during Tuesday’s hearing. “These are the types of choices that we will have to make.”
County vaccination efforts will also be the subject of a virtual discussion at City Hall on Tuesday at 7 pm, organized by the Montgomery County Council.
Low supply, very high demand
Overall, the supply of COVID-19 vaccines provided by Maryland is extremely limited. The county’s distribution for this week totaled just 7,300 first doses of the vaccine, officials told council members.
The demand, on the other hand, is high.
As a first step towards moving towards Phase 1b vaccinations, Montgomery County has allowed residents to apply for pre-registration for the next vaccination phase starting Friday.
As of Monday, some 53,000 people had applied for pre-registration for Phase 1b vaccinations, said Dr. Raymond Crowel, director of Montgomery County Health and Human Services.
Still, Riemer pushed for the elderly to start scheduling appointments for vaccines, even if weeks later.
“There is so much anxiety out there because the elderly are hearing that they can be vaccinated in Virginia, they can be vaccinated in DC, they can be vaccinated in Prince George County,” said Riemer. “But they cannot be vaccinated in Montgomery County, and that is unsustainable. We have to be able to offer that. “
There are no vaccines on the shelves
Health officials say they are running out of supplies of vaccines provided by the state each week and that there are no leftover doses on the shelves. In fact, in terms of the number of doses administered, the county leads the state.
The health officer, Dr. Travis Gayles, said that Montgomery County is consistently distributing all doses of vaccine it receives from the state each week. “We eliminated all the vaccines distributed … We don’t have any more,” he added.
Officials said the governor’s announcement last week to move to Phase 1b this week and 1c next “created a great expectation that there will be something available to people that does not exist,” said Stoddard, pointing to the limited supplies provided by the state.
Some council members said they had heard of Montgomery County residents aged 75 and over who made appointments in neighboring Prince George County, using the county’s digital application sheet.
Prince George County announced on Monday that from February 9, it will limit nominations for the Phase 1b vaccine to people who live and work only in its county.
Montgomery County officials said they are working on ways to expand the offer, including leveraging doses from hospitals – which receive their doses directly from the federal government – for public use or to vaccinate other types of health care workers still awaiting injections.
During Tuesday’s hearing, city councilors questioned how the state distributes the vaccines it receives from the federal government to various municipalities.
At-Large Council member Evan Glass called the state’s decision making “perplexed”.
“I am trying to find out how the state is distributing the short stock of vaccines we have fairly and equitably and why here in Montgomery County, with a population of almost 1.1 million people, our residents are no longer receiving,” said Glass. .
But, he added, “We are at the mercy of the state, and the state is at the mercy of the federal government.”
Phase 1c next week probably also delayed
In general, limited supply also risks delaying the move of the county to other layers of Phase 1b, such as teachers, as well as Phase 1c, which includes people aged 65 and over. According to state guidelines, Phase 1c is set to begin on January 25th.
In all, the state receives a total of about 72,000 weekly doses of vaccine from the federal government, which are distributed to counties.
Montgomery County alone estimates that there are between 100,000 and 140,000 of its residents being vaccinated in Phase 1b, which has not yet started.
“So if the state of Maryland gave us every dose the state received, it would take us at least two weeks to vaccinate everything that is in 1b before we can move to 1c,” said Stoddard.