Official: All of CT could get vaccine by ‘early fall’
State reaches COVID-19 high of nearly 5,000 new cases
Nearly 5,000 new COVID-19 cases were reported Thursday with a daily positivity rate of 7.13 percent — the highest Connecticut has seen during the pandemic — but the state’s health commissioner says they’re hopeful everyone could be vaccinated “by the early fall.”
“Much of that ... is dependent on supply and how many people raise their hand to be vaccinated,” Acting Public Health Commissioner Deidre Gifford said, adding that the estimate includes both doses of the vaccine.
The state reported 4,751 new cases, but 11 fewer CO
VID-19 hospitalizations occurred since Wednesday. It was the first time in recent weeks hospitalizations have declined.
But Gov. Ned Lamont cautioned that it was just a one-day statistic, and raised concerns about the high daily positivity rate.
“That’s the highest we’ve had, let’s cut to the chase,” Lamont said. “I think a lot of that was not unexpected.”
“But it’s a big number,” he said.
Lamont discussed the latest data during a news conference that mainly centered on the state’s plan for distributing a COVID-19
vaccine.
Connecticut health officials expect to receive the first shipments of the vaccine developed by Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech on Dec. 14, after the Food and Drug Administration’s review on Dec. 10.
Doses of a second vaccine developed by Moderna are expected to be delivered beginning on Dec. 21, after the FDA’s review on Dec. 17.
That undertaking will see residents of nursing homes vaccinated through a partnership with CVS and Walgreens pharmacies.
That’s in line with guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which released its own vaccine distribution guidance earlier this week.
Health care workers, including nursing home staff, and medical first responders such as EMTs, firefighters and police will also be top priority for the vaccine.
“Right now, the dosage allocation that we have been given would allow us to do a first dose of almost the entire health care and nursing home population by the end of January,” said Gifford, one of the co-chairs of Lamont’s vaccine advisory group.
After that first group, dubbed “Phase 1A,” comes others high on the priority list for the vaccine.
That “Phase 1B” round of vaccinations will focus on the state’s “critical workforce,” the governor said.
“These are folks on the front lines ... day care, food service workers, folks taking care of the most disadvantaged in the community,” he said.
Also included — adults over the age of 65, teachers, those at high risk under the age of 65, and the state’s prison population.
On Wednesday, the Con
necticut American Civil Liberties Union called for inmates to be vaccinated at the same time as nursing home residents. But the organization's executive director dialed back that claim Thursday following the governor's press conference.
David McGuire, the organization’s executive director, said Thursday those in the custody of the state Department of Correction who are over 65 or medically vulnerable should be included in Phase 1A of the vaccine rollout.
The rest of the inmates, who he noted are “disproportionately Black and brown folks,” should be in the first wave of Phase 1B, McGuire said.
Lamont has said teachers should be among the first to receive the vaccine in Connecticut, but the timeline for when inmates, guards and other facility staff would receive a shot remains unclear.
Gifford said health care workers in DOC facilities will be vaccinated along with other health care professionals in the first wave.
“I will say for the incarcerated, they had one of the lowest infection rates in the country for most of the summer,” Lamont said Wednesday .
He pointed to efforts to “de-densify” some facilities to give them extra capacity. “But it is ticking up again with facilities, just like it is around the rest of the state.”
He also pointed to efforts to disinfect facilities and provide masks. “My instinct right now is focus on the hospitals, make sure we have enough capacity — beds, nurses, docs ... that means I get them vaccinated, the elderly folks that are most likely at risk, I think that’s going to be our priority for the first 30 days.”
Phase 2 of the vaccine distribution plan will be open to everyone else who wants