Pa. teachers to get shots 1st
State works to speed return of in-person classes
State officials on Thursday said COVID-19 vaccine clinics for teachers, other school staff members and child care workers will open across the state next week.
The announcement comes a day after Gov. Tom Wolf said educators and others who work in schools and child care settings will be prioritized for the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine.
Providing educators and support staff with the one-dose vaccine will speed up the full reopening of schools, the officials said, benefiting students, parents and the state’s economy.
“After an unprecedented year of shifts and turns and tensions, this vaccine will help students and teachers across Pennsylvania return where they want and need to be,” acting state Education Secretary Noe Ortega said. “This voluntary vaccine will help increase opportunities for students to learn in person and have greater access to
the services, programs and supports that help them grow.”
The state expects to receive an initial supply of 94,600 J& J vaccines, with an additional 30,000 going to local pharmacies through a federal program. All of the shots will be prioritized for educators.
The rollout will first focus on preK and elementary teachers, as well as staff members who work with students with the most vulnerable student populations, acting Health Secretary Alison Beam said.
“This special vaccination initiative will begin with those teaching and working in pre-K and elementary grades, with students with disabilities, with English as a second language learners, and with other
vulnerable students,” Ms. Beam said. “These schoolage populations benefit the most from in-person learning.”
Randy Padfield, director of the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency, said vaccination clinics for school staff members will start between Wednesday and March 13. The vast majority of the clinics will be able to provide up to 500 vaccinations a day, with some of the larger ones administering up to 1,000 daily.
The clinics will operate daily, including weekends. Vaccines will be stored at regional state health centers that can store and hold the quantities needed to support the clinics.
PEMA will work with AMI Expeditionary Healthcare LLC and the state National Guard to coordinate the clinics. The state’s 29 intermediate units will provide support for the clinics by scheduling eligible people with the public and private schools in their jurisdictions.
Each school will receive a specific schedule of available appointments, and appointments will be filled using an online tool that should make it easier to regulate the flow and provide efficiency.
Most clinics will occur at intermediate unit offices, but Mr. Padfield said PEMA has developed separate plans that cover a much larger geographic area or a higher number of school staff. Some of the plans include using multiple locations for clinics or mobile clinics that will be held at different places over a number of days.
Mr. Padfield credited PEMA’s partners at the state departments of Health and Education and AMI for their help in coordinating the clinics so quickly.
“They understand the unique opportunity that having the Johnson & Johnson vaccine presents us to assist with getting children back into school, especially those most vulnerable to learning loss that have been adversely affected by this pandemic,” he said. “This initiative will also help immensely to build the economy as we recover from the pandemic that has ravaged the nation over the past year.”
The doses being sent from the federal government to retail pharmacies will be used to inoculate child care workers.
Ms. Beam said the state will send pharmacies the contact information for licensed child care centers. Pharmacies will then reach out to those facilities with information about appointments, she said.
“Starting as soon as today, our retail pharmacy partners, Rite Aid, Topco and Walmart, will begin these efforts,” Ms. Beam said. “We are using local connections and trusted local providers to make this happen.”
School staff members had been in Phase 1B, or the second tier, of Pennsylvania’s vaccine rollout plan. The state remains in Phase 1A, the first tier, and it is unclear when the next phase will start.
The availability of the J&J vaccine for educators should help end one of the largest barriers to fully reopening schools: staff members who were afraid to return to their buildings because of the health risks associated with COVID-19.
The wait for school staff to become eligible for vaccines had led to tensions between some school administrations and communities that wanted in-person instruction and teachers unions that believed their members should be inoculated before returning to the classroom.
Mr. Wolf on Wednesday said the “bulk” of school and child care workers in the state should be able to receive a vaccination by the end of March, but more doses will likely be needed to finish the job.
While it is not yet known when the state will receive more shipments of the J&J vaccine, officials said the state will be ready to distribute them when they arrive.
“We have already been informed that it will be a few weeks until we receive additional Johnson & Johnson vaccine,” Ms. Beam said. “But as soon as we do, we will be ready to quickly get it into arms.”