Province reduces age threshold for vaccinations again
Like Premier Scott Moe did Thursday, thousands more Saskatchewan residents will be able to get their first COVID-19 shot on Friday as the province works to keep its vaccine clinics full.
Anyone ages 48 and up will be eligible starting Friday morning at 8 a.m. Booked appointments are open to anyone over that age, while drive-thru and walk-in clinics are currently open to anyone between the ages of 48 and 54.
Regina's drive-thru clinic is the one exception, where anyone ages 46 to 54 will be able to get their shot. For those living in the Northern Saskatchewan Administration District, anyone ages 40 and up is eligible.
“We're moving through the age categories very quickly right now,” Health Minister Paul Merriman told reporters Thursday.
“We want to keep getting vaccines in arms, so we'll continue to drop the age accordingly to make sure that all those clinics and that all of the drive-thrus and the walkins are busy.”
Regina's school divisions have been calling for priority vaccinations for all school staff ahead of their planned return to in-person classes on April 26, but Merriman pointed to the quickly falling age eligibility as justification for sticking to the age-based approach as much as possible.
“Once we get to the 40s ... I've been told that almost 60 per cent of the teachers will be eligible to get their vaccine at that point in time, so we're continuing to work with the age categories because that's the reason we're leading Canada in our vaccine distribution,” he said.
Another 7,956 COVID-19 vaccine doses were administered in the province on Wednesday, upping the total number of doses given to 315,405.
The new doses were given in the far north west (220), far north central (two), far north east (134), north west (619), north central (224), north east (39), Saskatoon (1,888), central west (146), central east (715), Regina (2,777), south west (116), south central (389) and south east (420). An extra 267 doses administered are still waiting for residence information.
But Saskatchewan may still struggle to hit the vaccination schedule laid out by Moe, which had at least first dose bookings open to everyone over the age of 18 by mid-may. For the past four days, the province has reported well under 10,000 daily new doses after a record 13,170 doses were delivered on Saturday.
Merriman said a slow vaccine supply is to blame for this, and pointed to delays in several Moderna shipments.
Between the appointments, drive-thrus and walk-in clinics — and pharmacies preparing to start delivering vaccines — he said the province has much more capacity than it currently has vaccines to fill.
Some politicians have been rolling up their sleeves to get their shot with the lowered age eligibility at Regina's drive-thru clinic. Moe arrived at Regina's drive-thru vaccine clinic around 3:30 p.m. Thursday and was out by 5 o'clock after getting his first dose. Merriman received his first dose on Wednesday and NDP education critic Carla Beck had hers on Thursday.
Clinics will be open in several communities on Friday. Moose Jaw, North Battleford, Prince Albert, Regina, Saskatoon and Swift Current will all have drive-thrus running, and walk-in clinics will be open in Weyburn and Yorkton.
For information on where each clinic is located and the hours they are open, visit saskhealthauthority.ca.
Saskatchewan also reported 293 new cases and two new deaths on Thursday.
This brings the province's death toll to 460 and means the first four months of 2021 have been twice as deadly as all of 2020 combined.
A total of 153 people who tested positive for COVID-19 died in 2020.
To date, 2021 has recorded 307 deaths. Of the two new deaths, one person was in their 70s from Regina and one was over the age of 80 in the south east zone.
The province's seven-day average of daily new cases also rose once again to 284, or 23.2 new cases per 100,000 population.
The new cases were in the Regina (87), Saskatoon (74), far north west (eight), north west (24), north central (eight), north east (five), central west (15), central east (22), south west (four), south central (four) and south east (24) zones. Another 18 cases are waiting for residence information.
Active cases sit at 2,599 after 223 more people recovered.