Kane County Health Department addresses concerns regarding COVID-19 vaccine
Kane County Public Health Committee discusses COVID-19 vaccine.
KANE COUNTY – Many residents of Kane County have expressed their frustration with the Kane County Health Department (KCHD), as news travels of neighboring counties moving forward with initiatives such as McHenry County’s utilization of a vacant building to open a mass COVID-19 vaccination clinic.
Kane County Board member and Public Health Committee Chair Jarett Sanchez even went on the record with CBS 2 news anchor Lauren Victory, to attempt to clear up some of the public outcry.
Sanchez had similarly discussed topics of concerns pertaining to the COVID-19 vaccine, at the Feb. 17 Kane County Public Health Committee meeting.
At the meeting, Community Health director Michael Isaacson described the process into how KCHD allocates the vaccine to participating providers, as well as echoing what other local health departments have been stating in regards to the vaccine shortage.
“For the current week, we’re actually getting less than 1,500 new first doses from the state. So, we’re getting 500 Moderna and 975 Pfizer that can be used to vaccinate people with their first dose,” Isaacson said on Feb. 17.
“So, the requests that are coming in are typically in the thousands so that we’re only getting 1,500, I think just frames this supply issue that we have right now that we need much more vaccine, and that we have much more capacity in our community.”
Isaacson told board members that the health department has requested more vaccines from the state, but typically those additional requests are not met.
“If we provided everybody two doses of vaccine, again we do have the Johnson & Johnson vaccine which is a one dose vaccine. Which we hope gets emergency use authorization here very soon, but right now, just for conservative planning, we hope to give everybody two shots. That’s 560,000 shots that need to be provided. So, you can see, we’ve given about 60,000 in our community so far,” Isaacson said.
“We’re making progress. Again, it’s slow. Only getting 1,500 doses this week is not helping us to really accelerate what we’re doing, but we’re moving in the right direction from my perspective even though again, it doesn’t help with making it clear in a one stop shop if more doses are coming into our local pharmacies and are available to our residents. I think that’s a good thing.”
Isaacson also cautioned residents about the data presented on the Illinois Department of Public Health’s (IDPH) website. Stating that the inventory and other data points shown in terms of the COVID-19 vaccine, is not always fully reflective of current state of affairs in Kane County.
“So, when the public looks at this [data] or any officials look at this, we just want to make people aware that sometimes it’s a little deceptive when [IDPH] says we have an inventory. We’re not sitting on it. We have a plan for that. It’s going to be used within the week,” Isaacson said, describing how some vaccine shipments allocated to KCHD are only to be used for second doses.
“When vaccines do become available, we can work with not only shots at the health department [being administered], but also helping to coordinate with other pharmacies so they can go into large churches and community centers…We are going to be making more opportunities available for community clinics,” he continued.
“But the way we are doing it through our medical partners and through the pharmacies, is also getting shots into people’s arms, just as quickly.”
Sanchez stated that although the vaccine supply is low at the moment, Kane County was able to secure a $1.25 million grant from IDPH in order to go towards a future mass vaccination site.
“So, this is huge specifically for developing a mass vaccination site that everyone wants. They have them in Lake County [and] McHenry County, but right now they’re empty. They don’t have a lot of vaccine supply up there,” Sanchez said.
“So, they do have these sites and right now, we’re using the Kane County Fairgrounds which has been really great for our events so far, but it’s not ideal going forward. Especially if we’re talking the 65 and older crowd. Being at the Fairgrounds last week with all the snow and the way the parking lots are, it’s a nightmare just imagining having all these older people come into that site.”
Sanchez continued on stating that the IDPH grant will go a long way into helping KCHD establish a permanent vaccination site as the supply of vaccine increases in the near future.
“It’ll be the thing that everyone wants. Just one place to go. You sign up, and you get your shot. I know we are scouting sites. [We’re] looking at South Elgin as sort of a good central location to the county so waiting on some reports from OEM (Original Equipment Manager) and some health department staff on that going forward, but this grant is going to be the thing that really makes this happen,” he said.
Kane County Board Chairwoman Mavis Bates, D-Aurora, commented that for folks in her area, South Elgin wouldn’t exactly be considered a central point in the county. She questioned whether it was possible for multiple mass vaccination sites to be established throughout the county.
Sanchez responded by stating that while he agrees that the potential South Elgin location may not exactly be located in central Kane County, it is just one option that is being explored.
He stated that the health department is still scouting other locations throughout the county, but would have further information to report on that at the next Public Health Committee meeting that is taking place on March 21.
