People in Shelby County jail to get virus vaccines
People incarcerated at 201 Poplar will receive COVID-19 vaccinations Thursday, the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office announced Tuesday.
Incarcerated people at the jail who requested a COVID-19 vaccine will receive either Pfizer or Moderna shots, SCSO said. Plans for administering the second dose of the respective vaccines were not immediately clear.
The jail will not administer the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, SCSO said.
Administration of the shot was halted in Memphis Tuesday morning, after the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended a pause due to reports of blood clots in six of nearly 7 million people who have received the vaccine.
SCSO said that moving forward, whenever people are booked into the jail, they will be asked about being vaccinated. Incarcerated people who previously declined the vaccine, the agency said, are able to change their decisions and receive the vaccine.
“The detainees receive educational materials about the vaccine,” SCSO wrote in the announcement. “They know that there will be no punitive actions taken in connection with their decisions.”
The announcement is the “final action” SCSO says it is required to take relevant to a consent decree established with a class-action lawsuit against the jail.
The suit came after an April announcement that about 200 inmates and staff at the Shelby County Criminal Justice Center tested positive for COVID-19 and a corrections deputy who worked with detainees at the main jail died. The suit sought release of incarcerated people most vulnerable to COVID-19 and alleged that conditions of the jail were not in line with COVID-19 protocols established by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
An agreement was reached in the suit in December. Under the agreement, the jail would provide incarcerated people with free access to soap and cleaning products and two facial coverings “upgraded as warranted.” The jail also clarified its protocols for quarantine and isolation in announcing the agreement.
To further fight the pandemic, the sheriff ’s office will work with an independent inspector who will visit the jail quarterly.
In late March, Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris announced that incarcerated people in Shelby County facilities would soon receive COVID-19 vaccine.
The Shelby County Health Department was expected to administer the vaccine at the Shelby County Division of Corrections, known as the penal farm, while Wellpath LLC, the health care provider for the county’s inmates, was expected to administer the vaccine at Jail East, the Juvenile Detention Center and 201 Poplar, he said. The vaccine was expected to come from the state via the City of Memphis.
At the time, Wellpath was not qualified to deliver vaccinations in Tennessee or Shelby County, but had applied to the state for the authority to do so, Harris said.
A spokesperson for SCSO did not immediately respond to a request to clarify details about who would administer the vaccines Thursday, or how many would be administered.
Laura Testino covers education and children’s issues for the Commercial Appeal. Reach her at laura. testino@commercialappeal.com or 901-512-3763. Find her on Twitter: @Ldtestino.