‘We have the will’ but more COVID vaccines needed, Whatcom health says, urging patience
Washington state may have expanded its list of who can get the COVID-19 vaccine — in what’s known as Phase 1B, which includes the elderly, teachers and agriculture workers — but that doesn’t mean it’s available to all Whatcom County residents in those groups yet.
That has the Whatcom County Health Department, as well as state leaders, asking for patience amid a vaccine roll-out that has been slower than expected and bumpy.
“We have the will, the fire, and the ability to get everyone in Whatcom vaccinated, but we don’t have the vaccines,” said Cindy Hollinsworth, Communicable Disease manager for the Whatcom County Health Department, in a news release on Monday night, Jan. 18.
Planning has been challenging because vaccine shipments to providers in Whatcom County have varied — from as much as 5,000 doses a week to as little as 300, according to the release.
Whatcom County hasn’t yet received information from the Washington State Department of Health about how many vaccine doses will be allocated for providers this week. Such details usually are provided on Sundays or Mondays, Melissa Morin, spokesperson for the Whatcom County Health Department, said in an email to The Bellingham Herald on Tuesday.
Just 9,000 doses have been distributed by the state Department of Health to vaccine providers in Whatcom County, as of last week. That’s enough to give a first dose to about 50% to 60% of those in the first tier in Phase 1A, public health officials in Whatcom said in the release.
County health officials said the efforts have been further complicated by failures of the federal Pharmacy Partnership for Long-Term Care Program, which has required “some of Whatcom County’s most vulnerable community members working and living in long-term care facilities have instead had to be vaccinated by local providers,” they said.
The federal program is a parallel vaccine distribution effort. The facilities in the program receive doses allocated from the entire pool for Washington state, rather than the pool that’s specific to Whatcom County, Morin explained to The Bellingham Herald.
“Vaccine providers in the federal program failed to follow through on scheduled vaccinations for workers and residents at a small number of long-term care facilities, which the program was intended to do,” Morin added. “Instead, a local provider stepped up to vaccinate this group from Whatcom County’s vaccine allocation.”
Tier 1 in Phase 1A is made up of high-risk workers in health care settings, first responders in medical fields who are at high risk of being exposed to COVID-19, and residents and staff in nursing homes. This phase also includes a second tier made up of all other workers in health care settings at risk of contracting or spreading the respiratory illness.
All people in Phase 1A are eligible for the COVID-19 vaccine, the county health department said, adding that people in that category remain the priority because vaccine demand still exceeds supply.
In announcing plans to accelerate the pace of vaccine distribution, Gov. Jay Inslee on Monday also urged Washington state residents to be patient — a sentiment that’s being echoed in Whatcom County.
“Patience will still be required once Whatcom County providers begin vaccinating people in Phase 1B Tier 1,” the county health department said in a release. “Washington state currently has enough doses to vaccinate 100,000 people a week, but there are more than 1 million Washingtonians in the 1B Tier 1 group. In Whatcom County alone, there are just under 42,000 people aged 65 and older.”
Who’s in that first tier of Phase 1B? Those people include:
▪ All those who are 65 years and older.
▪ All residents who are 50 years or older in multi-generational households, which are homes where two or more generations live, such as an elder and a grandchild.
Others who are in Phase 1B will be vaccinated at later stages, including high-risk critical workers who are 50 and older and working in congregate settings such as K-12 teachers and agriculture workers.
More people in Whatcom County are contacting health care providers here and the health department about vaccine access, which officials described as “an increasingly demanding volume of calls.”
They are urging people in Phase 1B Tier 1 to check with their health care provider’s website for updated information about vaccine availability instead of calling.
Meanwhile, people in Phase 1A who haven’t been vaccinated should contact their employers, the health department said.
“What’s needed most right now from the community is patience,” Hollinsworth said in the release. “Everyone will have the chance to get vaccinated. We know vaccination needs to move faster in our country, our state and our county. We’re doing what we can to speed this along. Please be flexible and adaptive for a little while longer.”
As the pandemic continues to surge in Whatcom County, health officials are reminding residents to keep wearing masks, wash their hands often, keep a 6-foot distance from people they’re not living with, and limit gatherings with people from outside their household as much as possible, especially those that take place indoors.
“These steps are proven to reduce the spread while so many people in the community don’t yet have access to the COVID-19 vaccine,” the county health department said in its release.
Vaccine information
Learn more online at:
▪ whatcomcounty.us/covidvaccine — the Whatcom County Health Department will provide updates on vaccine availability when it has those details.
▪ whatcomcounty.us/coviddata for COVID-19 vaccine-related data from the Washington State Department of Health, which is expected within seven days.
▪ CovidVaccineWA.org has a breakdown of vaccination phases and the vaccination timeline in Washington state.
This story was originally published January 19, 2021 at 1:00 PM.
