COLOMBIA – South Carolina is expanding who is allowed to give COVID-19 vaccines in an effort to deliver vaccines more quickly amid growing frustration with the state’s slow implementation.
Two large hospitals say they can vaccinate up to 10,000 people a day – three times more than their current capacity – with additional help to administer vaccines as shipments increase.
Meanwhile, the state’s public health agency is giving up on tracking infected people’s contacts after being overwhelmed by a sharp increase in COVID cases.
An agreement signed Thursday between state health and licensing agencies means that retired nurses, medical students, assistants and others with medical certification can start giving vaccines as long as they enroll in the federal vaccine program COVID-19 . It is not clear how many people will sign up to be added to the venture.
Those currently able to give the vaccine in South Carolina include doctors, medical assistants, pharmacists and advanced practice nurses. A registered nurse can on doctor’s orders. And emergency medical technicians can, if they have taken a two-hour training course and meet other conditions, including on-site supervision, according to the state Department of Health and Environmental Control.
“This joint order proactively puts us in a position to have more people who can administer the vaccine when the vaccine is more widely available to everyone,” said Marshall Taylor, interim director of DHEC.
Agency officials say there are enough health workers under the existing law to distribute the state’s current vaccine supply, so the current rules on who can deliver the vaccines have not contributed to people’s slow rate of complaints. But not expanding the number of vaccinators would hinder the increase in vaccines provided by the federal government.
If DHEC had not introduced the change, lawmakers were prepared to force the expansion.
Senator Tom Davis, R-Beaufort, intended on Thursday to speed up legislation to temporarily change state law to expand the group of health professionals legally able to administer vaccines. The group of people who can do this now is very small, hospital administrators told their subcommittee.
The Medical University of South Carolina vaccinated 3,000 people on Wednesday and hopes to increase that number to 10,000 a day by the end of the month. The move will help significantly, said Dr. Patrick Cawley, chief executive of MUSC Heath, adding “but we also need vaccine supplies.
“We will be able to vaccinate more people and more economically,” Cawley told senators about the request. “Do it safely and quickly, too.”
Prisma Health, the state’s largest hospital system, is setting up mass vaccination centers in Columbia and Greenville, where it also hopes to increase to 10,000 daily injections in the coming weeks.
Minutes before Davis was set to bring the legislation to the Senate floor for discussion, the governor’s office informed him that authority was being granted, he said.
But he did not completely abandon him. If the agreement between DHEC and the state’s Department of Labor Licensing and Regulation does not go far enough, Davis said he will resume expansion through legislation.
On Wednesday, 52 percent of the 195,200 doses of the Pfizer vaccine sent to South Carolina since mid-December were administered to eligible health workers and first responders. An additional 119,105 doses are reserved by appointment, according to DHEC.
Southern Carolinians aged 70 and over, who became eligible for the vaccine on Wednesday, found that they would not be able to get an appointment for weeks, if at all.
“Obviously, we are having logistical problems now. It will be much more dysfunctional when supply increases,” said Davis of the need for expansion.
Of course, he added, “We are talking about putting a needle in people’s arms.”
Last week, the state’s public health director told reporters that DHEC was exploring the expansion of who can give injections. But the agency did not answer follow-up questions at the time about what was needed to do this or what was preventing it. It is not yet clear.
The signed order indicates that DHEC has been in authority since March, when McMaster first declared the state of emergency and activated the state’s Emergency Health Powers Act.
Lawmakers, who were inundated with complaints, were unwilling to wait any longer.
“To increase the alarmingly low vaccination rates across the state, it is essential that the contingent of health professionals authorized to administer these COVID-19 vaccines be temporarily expanded as much as possible, without compromising public safety,” says the filed measure. Tuesday by Sen. Mike Gambrell, R-Belton.
DHEC also changed efforts on Thursday to control the spread of COVID-19.
With the number of cases recorded in South Carolina going from 4,000 a day – to 5,000 on the day of last week – the agency is giving up on trying to conduct a close contact investigation for each person diagnosed.
The agency hired hundreds of workers to call people who tested positive for the disease to reconstruct where they went and identify who they might have spread to, hoping to inform them of the need for quarantine and get tested before spreading. more.
People are considered contagious 48 hours before the onset of symptoms or, in the case of asymptomatic patients, before being tested. Close contacts are people close to you for at least 15 minutes.
Davis, who led a Senate panel on COVID-19 testing in the fall, believes contact tracking should continue. The launch of the vaccine does not lessen the need for robust contact screening, he said.
If it is a question of money to hire more people, DHEC need only ask, he said, repeating what the senators told the agency in the fall.
“This General Assembly, I know, is ready to appropriate the funds to do both. We have the money, ”he said, referring to federal aid.
Lauren Sausser contributed to this report.