Only third of jabs in arms so far

Challenges in remote regions slowing Sask.'s vaccination plans

While the provincial government says it is getting COVID-19 vaccines into the arms of Saskatchewan residents as quickly as it can, only a third of its current vaccine stock has been administered to date.

Health Minister Paul Merriman told reporters during a news conference on Wednesday that vaccines are being delivered and administered “as quickly as possible, given the limited number of vaccines that we have received to date.”

According to the federal government's website, Saskatchewan had received a total of 13,675 vaccines as of Dec. 31, which includes 8,775 Pfizer and 4,900 Moderna.

As of Wednesday, the province had administered just 4,524 doses to date, leaving more than 9,000 doses in the province's hands but not yet administered.

Merriman said some of the delay in getting these into residents' arms is because the federal government and Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) required the province to hold back all the second Pfizer doses needed to complete the pilot project that saw health care workers in Regina receive the first vaccines. That pilot involved 3,900 doses, of which half were kept back as second doses.

This holding back of second doses was only required in the pilot phase, and Merriman said the province will not be holding back any other doses going forward.

“We will be administering the vaccines as soon as we receive them,” he said.

Distribution challenges in the far northern regions of the province, which are being targeted with the 4,900 Moderna doses received last week, are also slowing down progress. Just 48 of those Modern doses have been administered so far.

“In northern Saskatchewan, there is logistical challenges up there. This isn't where we can do 5,000 or 1,000 people over a short amount of time,” Merriman said. “It is going to go slower in the north.”

Because certain people are prioritized to receive the vaccine, only a few people in each remote community — like health care workers, long-term care residents and staff and people over the age of 50 — are currently receiving the vaccine.

“It's small amounts of people across huge geographies,” said the province's chief medical health officer, Dr. Saqib Shahab.

Even as the province grapples with logistical issues getting its current doses into arms, Merriman laid blame on the federal government for the slow rollout, saying Saskatchewan has not received enough doses to move more quickly.

He said Saskatchewan has been told to expect a total of around 30,000 doses by the end of January, which includes weekly shipments of around 6,800 Pfizer doses and a single shipment of around 5,300 Moderna doses.

“We could get absolutely more vaccinations done more quickly if and when the federal government provides us with more doses,” Merriman said. “This is just simply not near enough, and it is significantly less than they promised us just last month.”

Both Merriman and Shahab said they were confident that the province would be able to handle a much faster rollout once vaccinations begin for the general population in the larger urban communities.

Victoria Hospital in Prince Albert received 3,900 doses of the Pfizer vaccine on Wednesday, which will be given to priority health care workers and long-term care residents and staff.

The province also said the remaining Moderna doses — around 4,852 — will be delivered to the far north east and north east zones.

Initially those doses had been scheduled for delivery to the far north central and far north west zones.

An ultracold freezer from the University of Regina is also being moved to North Battleford to allow for delivery of Pfizer vaccines to the north east zone sometime this month.

Wednesday's vaccine update came as Saskatchewan reported nine new deaths, bringing the provincial death toll to 174.

There were also 277 new cases and 439 recoveries announced, dropping the number of active cases to 2,893.

One death was a person in their 20s from Regina.

Two more people from Regina in their 80s also died after testing positive for COVID-19.

The other deaths were two Saskatoon residents, one in their 50s and another in their 60s, one person in their 80s from the north central zone, two people in their 80s from the south east and one person in their 60s from the central west zone of the province.