Vaccine is coming, but will there be enough?
It’s expected to arrive next month, but volume remains unknown
COVID-19 vaccine is expected in February for residents and staff of long-term care homes, but the medical officer of health says she doesn’t know how many doses are coming — so there could potentially be a shortage.
“If we run out of vaccine and we have to pause (the inoculation rollout) — we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” Dr. Rosana Salvaterra told the board of health at a virtual meeting Wednesday night.
Salvaterra said earlier this week at a press briefing that residents, staff and essential caregivers of residents in all eight of the long-term-care homes in the city and county can expect to receive their first dose of vaccine by Feb. 15.
Although she said Wednesday she believes the first doses could potentially begin arriving in Peterborough on Feb. 3 — for vaccine rollout to begin in longterm-care homes on Feb. 4 — there’s still no indication of how much vaccine is coming.
“We’ve had no notification yet of how much vaccine to expect,” Salvaterra told the health board. “So it’s a bit of a fluid situation, some unknowns — but we are doing our best to plan with the information that we have.”
Salvaterra also told the health board that Peterborough Public Health will be posting online which groups of local people are being vaccinated when — and how many vaccines have been
administered.
Although the provincial government has ordered a sequencing for which groups of people get vaccinated first, Salvaterra said there may be good reasons to put one group ahead of another locally.
She cited an example in Windsor, where firefighters advocated to go up the list because they respond to medical calls. A similar situation could potentially arise here, Salvaterra said.
“And if we have to stray at all from the provincially-mandated hierarchy, we will post that — and we will provide the rationale,” she said.
“If there’s a compelling reason why we have to vaccinate someone who’s not at the top of the list, we will be accountable to the public.”
Meanwhile Peterborough’s likely to see far more use of rapid testing soon: Salvaterra said the health unit has acquired its own rapid-testing equipment, for example, that should be in use within the next three to four weeks.
Curve Lake First Nation is getting new rapid antigen testing equipment, too, she said. All this equipment is handy in instances such as testing symptomatic staff in long-term-care homes, she said.
“We will see much more rapid testing in Peterborough, in the next few weeks to months.”
Nine new cases, one outbreak over
Nine new COVID-19 cases in Peterborough city and county, Curve Lake First Nation and Hiawatha First Nation were reported Wednesday afternoon by Peterborough Public Health.
Seven more cases have also been resolved, resulting in 53 active cases, up from 51 on Tuesday.
The jurisdiction has now had 455 cumulative cases, with 396 resolved and five earlier deaths.
An outbreak at a Stewart Homes group home on Brealey Drive was lifted on Wednesday, but outbreaks continue at a Community Living group home on Rubidge Street and at Fairhaven long-term-care home on Dutton Road after a staff member in the Westview 3 area tested positive on a rapid test.
Three new confirmed COVID-19 cases in Northumberland County and two in the City of Kawartha Lakes were reported Wednesday afternoon by the Haliburton, Kawartha, Pine Ridge District Health Unit.
There has also been a new hospitalization of a case in Northumberland County.
Eight cases in the City of Kawartha Lakes and seven in Northumberland County have recovered, the health unit also reported.
The jurisdiction now has a cumulative total of 671 cases with 64 active cases and one additional probable case.
A new COVID-19 outbreak was declared Monday at the Tower of Port Hope retirement residence after a resident tested positive. The resident is in isolation.