NC governor says state will decide this week when to expand COVID vaccine availability
Update: Gov. Roy Cooper announced Wednesday that North Carolina teachers and educators will be eligible for COVID vaccine this month with other front-line essential workers becoming eligible in March. Details here.
N.C. Gov. Roy Cooper said Tuesday that the state will announce this week when it will widen the availability of COVID-19 vaccines to include teachers, firefighters and other front-line essential workers.
At a press conference Tuesday, Cooper said the state will provide “precise dates” that those front-line essential workers, known as Group 3 in North Carolina, will be eligible for vaccines. For now, he said, there’s still not enough vaccine to meet the demand of the first two groups of eligible people: health care workers and people ages 65 and older.
“There are thousands and thousands of people who are on waiting lists across the state who are 65 and over,” Cooper said. “We’re working on getting more supply and making sure that people 65 and older get vaccinated.”
Dr. Mandy Cohen, secretary of the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services, said the state has vaccinated about half of those in Group 2 who are 65 and older.
Cooper also said the state would work harder to increase vaccinations among Black and Latinx residents, who have so far lagged behind the overall population. Black people accounted for 18% of those who were vaccinated in the state last week, Cooper said, up from 11% four weeks ago.
“This is an improvement,” he said, “but there is more work to be done when North Carolina’s population is 22% Black.”
Vaccinating workers
The state is under growing pressure to make vaccines available to front-line essential workers — people who need to do their jobs in-person such as teachers, grocery store workers and agricultural workers.
Some educators have said they want to be vaccinated before they step back into the classroom. Cohen said that if schools follow required safety protocols, it is safe to reopen schools.
Many schools have already been open for in-person learning for months. Elementary schools were allowed to reopen for in-person, daily instruction in October, if their school districts permitted it. Middle and high schools are allowed to be open under Plan B, which requires six feet of social distancing. All students and staff are required to wear masks.
Other front-line workers are also concerned about when they will be able to be vaccinated.
Andy Ellen, the president of the N.C. Retail Merchants Association, told the House Health Standing Committee on Tuesday that his members need more information about when the state plans to begin vaccinating their employees.
“I think it’s really important that we, as a state, give an estimated timeline of when that may be,” Ellen said. “That will only promote trust in the vaccine, because many of these employees are looking to their employers for confidence and trust to go get the vaccine.”
Ellen also said the state should more aggressively enlist pharmacies to help with the vaccination effort. Now, some health departments are transferring vaccine to some pharmacies, and Walgreens is preparing to start offering vaccinations at 313 North Carolina locations later this week.
But, Ellen said, neighboring states up and down the East Coast are all sending vaccine directly to pharmacies.
“We could be a good solution to helping with the administration of the vaccine going forward,” Ellen said.
At the press conference, Cooper said the problem is not a lack of vaccination sites, it’s a shortage of vaccine. He said he and other governors made that case during a call with representatives of the Biden Administration earlier in the day.
“We’re doing everything we can to encourage the federal government to increase the supply of vaccines in North Carolina,” he said. “We can handle many, many more vaccines.”
The Biden Administration said it would increase next week’s allotment by 5%, but Cohen said the state is still assessing how many more doses that means.
But the state will be ready when those doses are available, she said, and “want more vaccine providers waiting in the wings if you will.”
Cooper issued an executive order that allows licensing boards to increase the number of providers who can administer vaccine, including dentists as well as advanced medical students and retired physicians who may have inactive licenses.
“We are not short on vaccine providers; we are short on vaccines,” Cohen said. “But we do want to get ready and on-board providers so when our supply does increase that we make sure that we can continue both the speed and the equity that we’re working under.”
Relief bill still pending
Cooper has yet to sign a bill that provides money to help schools reopen during the coronavirus pandemic and to distribute vaccines.
Senate Bill 36, COVID Relief Bill Modifications, was passed by the North Carolina General Assembly last week. In addition to funding vaccine distribution and the reopening of schools, it extends the deadline for parents to apply for $335 checks who qualified to receive them last year but did not.
The bill also includes $1.6 billion for schools to help them reopen safely for in-person learning. That money would be given to an elementary and secondary school emergency relief fund in the Department of Public Instruction. There is also $95 million to help with vaccine distribution in the state.
North Carolina continues to emerge from a post-holiday peak in coronavirus cases, hospitalizations and deaths. On Tuesday, the state reported 2,786 additional coronavirus cases, bringing the total to 802,065, according to NC DHHS. That’s down from more than 6,400 cases reported each day on average in January.
However, the state reported more than 10,000 COVID-19 deaths since the pandemic hit North Carolina in March.
The number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 at a given time also peaked last month, at nearly 4,000. On Tuesday, the state reported that 2,374 people were being treated with COVID-19.
North Carolina remains in Phase 3 of reopening. The current phase includes a statewide mask mandate and curfew from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m., as well as restrictions on the size of gatherings.
In late January, Cooper extended the modified stay-at-home order again, this time until Feb. 28. The curfew has been in place since early December. An executive order that allows bars and restaurants to sell cocktails to-go is in place until March 31.
Adam Wagner contributed.
This story was originally published February 9, 2021 at 3:13 PM with the headline "NC governor says state will decide this week when to expand COVID vaccine availability."
