DHD#10 Vaccinates Close To 1400 on Friday

185 in Our County Take One for the Team
 
January 9, 2021 –District Health Department #10 (DHD#10) reports approximately 1,400 COVID-19 vaccines were administered on Friday, January 8, during vaccine clinics throughout our ten-county jurisdiction. 
  
“We couldn’t be prouder of our staff who put in an enormous effort to vaccinate almost 1,400 individuals on Friday,” stated Kevin Hughes, Health Officer for DHD#10. “The work that went into accomplishing this operation was significant and our team is prepared to do the same at vaccine clinics throughout the week next week and the coming weeks and months.” 
 
Vaccine totals by county include: 

• Crawford - 103 
• Kalkaska - 108 
• Lake - 50 
• Manistee - 178 
• Mason - 160 
• Mecosta - 199 
• Missaukee - 69 
• Newaygo - 185 
• Oceana - 148 
• Wexford - 196 

 
Starting Monday, DHD#10 is hosting COVID-19 vaccine clinics in all ten counties, with clinics scheduled through Saturday in many of the DHD#10 locations. These clinics are by appointment only and are not walk-in clinics. Clinics are only for those in Phase 1A and some in Phase 1B, including Persons 65+, First Responders (Police and Fire), and Jail/Corrections staff. Due to limited vaccine supply, we cannot accommodate anyone without an appointment, and we are unable to schedule any additional appointments until more vaccine is available. DHD#10 will post the Electronic Scheduling Form on our website at www.dhd10.org sometime next week when we are notified how much vaccine the state is sending us. DHD#10 is currently working with other community resources and partners to offer an alternative to scheduling for those who do not have access to the internet. We will notify the public as soon as that option is launched. 
 
“What's important to realize is we cannot order more vaccine than we are able to push out through vaccine clinics. And we cannot schedule appointments if we do not have enough vaccine. We also must administer every vaccine in a vial once opened or they will spoil, so if a clinic only has three people registered, we may not be able to host it. We will be making adjustments frequently along the way while vaccine supply is limited,” stated Hughes. 
 
Vaccine allocation is distributed at the Federal level to each state and then states must determine how much to give to each hospital system and health department across the state.  
 
The general timeline for ordering and receiving the vaccine works like this (at least for now while it is uncertain how much vaccine is allotted each week): 

1. Each week, we place our vaccine order with the state by Thursday at noon. 
2. The state notifies us by Friday or Monday the allotment we will receive. 
3. The vaccine is delivered to our location on Tuesday or Wednesday and we distribute it to our ten counties on Wednesdays and Thursdays 
4. We can then host vaccine clinics on Fridays, and Saturdays 
5. If we find we have enough vaccine from the week previous, we can open up more clinics earlier in the week   

​This past week, DHD#10 requested 3,900 doses of the vaccine, plus had some vaccine supply from the previous week. We launched the Electronic Scheduling Form on Thursday afternoon to schedule clinics for the next week where over 7,000 people schedule in a 14-hour period. DHD#10 was notified Friday morning that we were only receiving 975 from the state, which prompted us to shut down scheduling until we could receive enough vaccine to accommodate those who already scheduled. Fortunately, we were able to secure enough vaccine from regional partners to accommodate most of the individuals who scheduled. We did have to reschedule or cancel some individuals.  
 
“Until the vaccine supply is more readily available, there may continue to be shifts, adjustments, cancellations, and reschedules in the foreseeable future. We will have to make last minute changes and all our plans may go out the window, but please know we are doing everything humanly possible to get this vaccine out to those in the priority groups and then to anyone who wants it.  We ask for continued patience as we work through this challenging and important effort,” stated Hughes. 
 
At this time, we ask that individuals please refrain from calling the health department to ask about scheduling the vaccine. We will continue to keep our communities updated via press release, social media, our website at www.dhd10.org/covid-19-vaccine, and our Public Health Alert. If you have not subscribed to our Public Health Alert, please do so atwww.dhd10.org/subscribe. We ask for your patience as we continue to plan and prepare for additional COVID-19 vaccination clinics.  ​