As Americans wait for COVID-19 vaccines to be deployed, health officials in the Culpeper and Fredericksburg areas are offering a glimpse of why lays ahead.
In the Rappahannock-Rapidan Health District, which serves the Culpeper area, Health Director Wade Kartchner said the initially limited vaccines will be distributed according to a tiered system of priorities.
“First responders, front-line health-care workers and residents of long-term care facilities will be among the first groups to receive the vaccine,” Kartchner told the Star-Exponent.
Most such individuals will be given the vaccine through existing channels in collaboration with the health department, or in conjunction with pharmacies, he said.
The health department will be heavily involved in providing vaccines to later tiers of the region’s population, Kartchner said.
People are also reading…
The five-county district serves Culpeper, Orange, Madison, Fauquier and Rappahannock counties.
To the east in the Fredericksburg area, Joe Saitta is leading the effort that eventually will bring COVID-19 vaccinations to local residents. He said he “can’t blame” people who have expressed concerns about vaccine safety.
But Saitta, who came out of retirement to help during the pandemic, wants people to know he and other public health workers are focused on health and safety—not a political agenda.
“I have no incentive to have some company push out a vaccine [before it’s ready] and then all my neighbors get a third eye and come charging up my driveway with pitchforks,” he said. “I live in this community.”
Saitta, 74, is a resident of Stafford County and the incident commander for the Rappahannock Area Health District. He’s led regular meetings since August about the logistics of delivering a vaccine to more than 375,000 people.
With this week’s news that a third pharmaceutical company has developed a COVID-19 vaccine which is at least 90 percent effective in late-stage trials, local, state and national officials are working on details on how the shots will be administered. The goal is to begin vaccinations as soon as the federal Food and Drug Administration approves the vaccines.
Although COVID-19 vaccines are expected to arrive in a few weeks, it will probably be well into 2021 before things get back to something close to normal in the United States, according to The Associated Press.
In the meantime, Americans are being warned not to let their guard down, the news cooperative said. Experts say face masks will remain crucial for some time.
Rather than prevent infection entirely, the first COVID-19 vaccines might only prevent illness. Vaccinated people might still be able to transmit the virus, the AP said.
In Virginia, the vaccine rollout will be headed by officials who lead the commonwealth’s 35 health districts.
Public health officials will follow the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s tiered system, which says the first vaccines will go to those in health care, law enforcement, fire and rescue, education and those who make up a local government’s infrastructure. In each regional health district, localities will decide who’s in the last group, Saitta said.
In the Fredericksburg area, the first tier includes about 35,000 local people, Saitta said.
He’s been relieved to learn the health district won’t have “to do this all by ourselves.” The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs will vaccinate all veterans while the Department of Defense will take care of all active-duty service members and their families.
The region has many military installations. And statewide, about one in every 10 Virginians has served in the military, according to Veterans Affairs.
CVS and Walgreen’s pharmacies will vaccinate all those in long-term care facilities.
Recent surveys suggest about 50 percent of Americans are ready to get vaccinated, while another 30 percent want to wait until more data is available.
To acquire “herd immunity,” when a large portion of a community becomes immune to a disease and makes its spread unlikely, about 70 percent of the population needs vaccination, according to the Mayo Clinic.
Rappahannock Area Health District officials hope to vaccinate people in the first tier in January and the general public by spring, spokeswoman Allison Balmes-John said.
She stressed that while researchers have only been working on a COVID-19 vaccine this year, the theory behind such vaccines is not new.
“They weren’t starting from square one,” Balmes-John said, “so that’s helpful to keep in mind as well.”
Similar vaccines, which help cells target a protein particular to a given virus—and even remember how to attack them in the future—have been used for years.
Likewise, Saitta’s team didn’t start working on plans for large-scale vaccinations this summer. Those began in 2002, when Saitta, then the Health District’s bioterrorism coordinator, laid the groundwork for flu-shot clinics, both at mobile sites and fixed locations.
Officials will use those same plans, just as they’ve done while providing COVID-19 testing throughout the Fredericksburg area. They hope to have up to three trailers, full of supplies, so that many teams can work at a location.
Earlier, the Rappahannock Area Health District used a $5,000 grant from Mary Washington Healthcare to buy needed supplies, such as cotton balls, Band-aids, alcohol prep pads, gloves, gowns, masks and shields.
Federal funds went to each state, which distributed them to health districts for the purchase of upright freezers—one in each locality—to keep the vaccine at ultra-cold temperatures until it’s ready for distribution. Federal money also was used to buy tents and propane heaters to provide workers warmth during the winter months when vaccine clinics will be held.
There are a lot of details involved. For instance, after buying the special freezers, health officials realized they needed backup generators in case the electricity went off.
“It’s like peeling an onion,” Saitta said. “Just when you think you’re got one piece figured out, another comes along. You get a pallet of PPE [personal protective equipment] delivered, and the next level is where do you put, how do you distribute it?”
While supplies are coming together, a critical piece of the puzzle is manpower. The health district has about 90 employees, 60 contractors and several hundred Medical Reserve Corps volunteers. Of the mix, less than 30 are vaccinators, and more will be needed, Saitta said.
He’s hoping the emergency-service agencies the health district has partnered with in the past will help again. Private companies, such as LifeCare Medical Transports, already have offered assistance.
Saitta is willing to consider any option.
It’s part of his job as incident commander. The title may conjure up images of a general issuing orders, but the man who first retired in 2009 said that’s not the case at all. He’s more likely to urge team members to take time off so they don’t get burned out over the long haul.
“I’m more the kindly old grandpa who got drafted to do this,” he said.