West Virginia long-term care facilities could begin vaccinating residents as soon as tonight as American begins a historic drive to hold the coronavirus pandemic at bay.
“It’s a wonderful day in West Virginia,” said Bill Crouch, secretary of the state Department of Health and Human Resources.
Tractor-trailers loaded with vaccine shipments pulled out of the Pfizer manufacturing plant in Portage, Michigan, just after dawn Sunday. That followed Friday night’s approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to offer the vaccine on an emergency basis.
Gov. Jim Justice said shipments of vaccine arrived today at hubs in Kanawha and Monongalia counties and would arrive Tuesday morning in Berkeley, Cabell and Greenbrier counties.
“I have all the faith in the world that this vaccine will work and this vaccine is safe,” Justice said today.
In West Virginia and elsewhere across the country, nursing homes and front-line health care workers are the top priority with the vaccine.
West Virginia leaders have repeatedly said nursing home residents have been especially hard-hit by the virus. Last week, West Virginia reported more than 100 outbreaks at long-term care facilities across the state.
“We will place initial emphasis in the most vulnerable in the general population based on the guidance of the CDC,” Justice said during a Friday briefing about the state’s coronavirus response.
West Virginia has five hubs to serve as central locations for handling the Pfizer vaccine.
Depending on what time the vaccine arrives at the hubs, some West Virginia long-term care facilities could begin vaccinations tonight, said Marty Wright, executive director of the West Virginia Health Care Association.
However, most nursing homes and assisted living facilities in the state are more likely to begin with vaccinations Tuesday and Wednesday, Wright said this morning.
If steps go as planned, then West Virginia will have completed giving all of the initial allotted doses to about 50 facilities of the total 214 by Friday, Wright said. Additional vaccinations are expected to take place after approval of a similar vaccine produced by Moderna.
The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines call for a second shot after a few weeks.
“Throughout this pandemic, the Governor and State leadership have prioritized protecting our long term care communities, and the distribution reflects this prioritization.,” Wright said.
“The state has an aggressive plan to get all staff and residents in nursing homes and assisted livings vaccinated through facility-pharmacy partnership statewide. By utilizing numerous pharmacies around the state, we plan to vaccinate more than 200 facilities in less than 3 weeks.”
Marty Wright, CEO of @WVHCA1, joins @DaveWilsonMN to discuss when we could expect the first vaccinations to be administered in West Virginia, and the drill he participated in with the WVNG to prepare for the upcoming distribution days. WATCH: https://t.co/wkudfIRZCB pic.twitter.com/pw452KoZPk
— MetroNews (@WVMetroNews) December 14, 2020
One of West Virginia’s largest nursing home companies, Stonerise Healthcare, described excitement that the vaccinations can soon begin. The company said it had already started sharing fact-based, educational information about the vaccine for patients, staff, their families and the public.
“We see the vaccine as a light at the end of a very dark tunnel, but we also know that even if our centers embrace the vaccine, but our entire communities do not, we will never be able to eradicate this devastating pandemic,” stated Larry Pack, the chief executive of Stonerise.
West Virginia’s plan calls for the vaccine to arrive in each hub, for supplies to be logged in and tracked. The vaccines will be properly placed in ultra-cold storage containers, and then supplies will be broken down into smaller shipments to be transported.
The Pfizer vaccine requires special handling from receipt at the hubs to eventual administration into a patient’s arm.
“Logistically, handling a massive vaccination process like this is a really, really heavy lift,” said Jim Kranz, vice president of data and quality services for the West Virginia Hospital Association.
From ultra-cold storage at the distribution hubs, to securely packaging each of the smaller shipments of vials in dry ice for transportation to administration sites, the process is highly-regulated to ensure the vaccines are safe and effective.
Members of the National Guard are anticipated to deliver shipments to pharmacies around the state this evening.
Pharmacy personnel will then go to long-term care facilities to administer the vaccine. The pharmacies and facility already have the vaccination days planned out, with most happening over the next 3 days.
The national rollout of the vaccine is unprecedented and complicated. The West Virginia National Guard and state agencies have been practicing to help assure distribution goes as smoothly as possible.
Members of the West Virginia Joint Interagency Task Force for Vaccines took part in a drill to simulate vaccine shipment receipt, handling and distribution on Friday.
“It is a very complex process and we’re going to do our very best to make sure we get it as efficiently and effectively as possible,” West Virginia Adjutant General James Hoyer said Friday on MetroNews’ Talkline.
“The most important thing we’ll do is communicate with each other. This is something we’ve not seen. We’ve never done this.”
West Virginia officials have submitted the state’s initial Pfizer vaccine order to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, requesting the state’s maximum-allowed weekly ordering cap of 16,575 doses.
West Virginia plans to receive an initial allocation of about 60,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine.
For Moderna’s version of the vaccine, expected about a week later, Justice said the initial allocation in West Virginia has been increased to 32,600 doses.
Justice had initially said West Virginia would receive 26,000 doses of the Moderna vaccine.
There will be a limited supply of the COVID-19 vaccine when it first becomes available, so the vaccine will be distributed in phases, based on risk for contracting COVID-19.
West Virginia’s Phase 1 is a multi-pronged approach, starting with nursing homes and hospital workers, as federal officials have recommended.
The next rollout for Phase 1 includes emergency responders and public health officials.
Phase 1 continues with other health care workers.
Up next, still in Phase 1, are teachers and “other sectors for critical services to the state, continuity of government, associations, utilities and transportation.”
“We are planning to offer vaccines to all individuals identified in 1A through 1D within the first six weeks based on the allocation of vaccine,” Justice said.
“As our allocation increases and distribution occurs we will be able to move through the phases more quickly.”
Phase 2 is the general population. Justice said the general population is expected to begin receiving the vaccine next March.