The first phase of vaccinations for COVID-19 is underway at the Vermilion County Health Department, and it is going well despite a number of challenges.
Administrator Doug Toole told WDAN’s Linda Bolton that vaccinations are being administered indoors. Tuesday’s first vaccinations saw 82 people turn out. The current phase is only for healthcare workers, and Emergency Planning and Response Coordinator Melissa Rome says they have to be distributed quickly once they are taken out of the freezer.
Rome says the next group to receive the vaccines will be frontline workers, followed by senior citizens and adults with chronic health conditions. She also says that some medical workers are actually choosing to delay getting vaccines.
“Some people just want to wait a few weeks to see how it goes,” she says. “It’s not that they won’t get it, but they just won’t get it right away. They want to see how everyone else does.”
As for the COVID-19 numbers, Rome says Vermilion County is actually not as bad as it was in the fall, other than a recent outbreak at the Danville prison. But Toole says while many people have been educated about wearing face masks and staying away from others, they seem to have a hard time following the guidelines locally.
“It is distressing to pick up the paper and see that we’re posting more new cases a day with a higher positivity rate than Champaign (County) right next door, that has almost double our population,” he says.
Toole also says that the Illinois Department of Public Health has partnered with pharmacy chains to distribute vaccines to nursing home residents, and some in Vermilion County have already received them.
