Utah Governor Spencer Cox addressed the response to the state’s coronavirus, including progress in delivering the vaccine, during a weekly news conference on Thursday.
The state is opening vaccines for people aged 65 and over, and those with certain chronic health conditions, starting March 1, Cox announced.
On Thursday morning, he added, “approximately 35% of all our elderly people aged 70 and over have been vaccinated. That’s about 84,000 of you, and that’s only in a few weeks, so we’re on track, again, to vaccinate those who are most at risk and save lives. “
Cox said the state has reached an “important milestone”: more doses of the COVID-19 vaccine – when the first and second doses are combined – have been administered than the number of positive tests reported in the state.
And 84,154 Utahns are fully vaccinated, having received both doses of the vaccine.
“We are trying to be more viral than the virus and this is happening,” he said.
The state is planning to receive another 33,000 doses of the new Johnson & Johnson vaccine per week by the end of March, Cox said. Another 84,000 per week of the AstraZeneca version of the vaccine could arrive by April, Cox said.
This volume “just changes the game of the ball for all of us and that is what we are planning,” he said. “This is what we are preparing for.”
As the state increases its distribution of vaccinations, Cox said “there will be programming problems”.
“There will be in every state, in every country in the world, there will be a little chaos in making this happen and we will embrace this chaos, we will resolve this chaos,” he said, “and we will receive vaccines in seven days after receiving the vaccine and we will save lives” .
In the next three weeks, Cox predicts that all elderly people aged 70 and over who wish to be vaccinated. “We are going to finish this group of people and move on to the next phase,” he said.
Cox assured Utahns that people over 70 who are struggling to get a vaccination appointment “will be able to make theirs” in the coming weeks.
In the next phase of eligibility, which begins on March 1, people aged 65 and over will be eligible to receive the vaccine.
The same will happen with people with certain chronic health conditions, representing about 400,000 people in the state aged 18 or over.
That list includes solid organ transplant recipients; certain types of cancer; immunocompromised people due to blood, bone marrow or bone transplantation, HIV or use of other drugs to weaken the immune system; severe kidney disease, on dialysis; people with uncontrolled diabetes; chronic liver disease; chronic heart disease; severe chronic respiratory disease, except asthma; Stroke and dementia.
Cox urged people not to call health departments to schedule vaccinations now, if they fall into one of those categories, and said additional information will come in the coming weeks.
“This will allow us to get back to normal more quickly, saving the lives of the most vulnerable,” he said.
State epidemiologist Dr. Angela Dunn said that local and state health departments will focus the rest of February on finishing putting vaccines in the arms of people 70 and older.
Once that broader eligibility opens on March 1, Dunn said, the state will have an honor system. “If you don’t fall into those categories … don’t look for a vaccine,” she said.
The faster the state is able to get through high-risk populations, the faster people at lower risk can be vaccinated, she added.
Lieutenant-Governor Deidre Henderson said that 29 Smith pharmacies and 18 Walmart locations will receive doses of vaccine in Utah starting February 11 – initially, only for Utahns over 70 years old.
“In fact, the state has control over who is eligible” to receive vaccines through Walmart and Smith’s, Henderson said.
People who book through the health department should attend these appointments, she said, rather than trying to get one through Smith’s or Walmart.
There will be more information on how Utahns can volunteer to help distribute the vaccine in the coming days, Henderson added.
Dunn also said that national media comparisons of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine’s effectiveness compared to Moderna and Pfizer were “misinformed.”
Johnson & Johnson trials have proven that the vaccine is effective in protecting 72% of US individuals against COVID-19 infection and is 85% effective against serious illnesses, she said.
“It is very important that as soon as the vaccine is available, when it is our turn to take it, we all receive the vaccine,” regardless of the company that produced it, she said.
Dunn said plans are being put in place to help inoculate homeless people and that Johnson & Johnson’s single dose vaccination may be particularly suitable for that population, once it is available.