Vaccine eligibility expanded as of March 15
In a week where more Georgians were made eligible to receive COVID-19 vaccines and a presidential announcement was made concerning nationwide eligibility for all adults, Gilmer County’s new COVID cases have declined, but, according to the director of North Georgia Health District, still remain high.
To date, 2,408 confirmed cases and 67 confirmed deaths have been listed for Gilmer County on Georgia Public Health’s daily COVID-19 status report.
The most recent two-week case rate per 100,000, which reflects the number of new cases, was 150 per 100,000, according to Dr. Zachary Taylor, health district director, during a quarterly meeting of the Gilmer County Board of Health held via teleconference last Tuesday.
“To put that into perspective, anything above 100 per 100,000 is considered high. The positivity rate is 7.2 percent and anything above 5 percent is considered high,” Taylor said. “There’s still ongoing transmission in Gilmer County. However, like the rest of the state and north Georgia, the number of new cases has been declining since the surge after the Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday period. There’s good news on that front, as long as we continue to have a decline in cases.”
During the March 9 teleconference, Nurse Manager Krystal Sumner said the Gilmer Health Department has administered 8,103 COVID-19 vaccinations since Jan. 11, when eligibility was expanded to include adults age 65+, their caregivers and police and fire personnel not already vaccinated.
“Initially, that was completed by just our staff at the health department, then we were lucky enough to get some agency nurses and agency clerical people to help us out,” Sumner added.
The health department’s official vaccine clinic location is still the Piedmont Community Center, located at 824 Industrial Boulevard.
“We moved to the Piedmont (building) because we were limited at the health department (with) parking spaces,” Sumner said during the teleconference. “Since we moved there, we can average one patient every 45 seconds, so we’ve really moved them through quickly. We’ve received compliments that we’re as efficient as Chick-fil-A, so I feel that’s about as good a compliment as we can get.”
Taylor said the local vaccination clinic would be capable of vaccinating 500-600 persons a day if that quantity of vaccine was available.
“We could quickly vaccinate a large part of the population at that point in time,” he added.
Sumner said the health department’s COVID vaccination efforts have also included residents of Parkside Skilled Nursing Care and 35 homebound persons.
Vaccination of school system employees was scheduled to get underway last week with the health department’s first shipment of the newly-released Johnson and Johnson vaccine.
“We have also resumed full operating hours at the health department,” Sumner noted.
Taylor commended the local health department staff, which, he said, has given 80 percent of COVID-19 vaccinations in the county thus far.
“They’ve done a remarkable job and I think they should be congratulated,” he noted.
Taylor touched on new CDC guidelines that allow fully vaccinated persons to safely gather with others who are also fully vaccinated, as well as visit those at low risk, both without a mask.
“That’s a good start to what we hope will be a gradual reopening of our communities in all aspects as we get more and more people vaccinated. If you’re fully vaccinated and haven’t seen your grandkids, you should,” he said. “For now, we encourage you to continue to wear a mask in public, to socially distance and to make sure you wash your hands and use hand sanitizer.”
Vaccine eligibility expanded
As of March 15, Georgia’s COVID vaccine eligibility was expanded to include adults age 55 and up, as well as persons with disabilities and certain medical conditions. The announcement was made by Georgia Public Health and Gov. Brian Kemp last week.
According to a release from Georgia Public Health, those medical conditions include moderate to severe asthma, immunocompromised, cancer, liver disease, cerebrovascular disease, neurological conditions, chronic kidney disease, overweight and obesity, COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease), pregnancy, cystic fibrosis, pulmonary fibrosis, diabetes, sickle cell disease, hypertension or high blood pressure, thalassemia (blood disorder) and heart conditions.
The expansion also includes those who’ve suffered disabilities caused by an injury (including traumatic brain or spinal cord injuries), a longstanding condition that could cause vision loss, nerve damage, loss of a limb or a disability due to illness including ALS and multiple sclerosis. Persons with intellectual and developmental disabilities were already eligible to be vaccinated.
Shortly following the announcement of Georgia’s broadened vaccine eligibility, President Joe Biden directed states to make all adults eligible to be vaccinated against COVID-19 by May 1. A national vaccine finder website will also be rolled out, Biden also announced.
As of Monday, appointments were still available for the Gilmer Health Department vaccination clinic at the Piedmont building.
“Appointments are available by phone every day. We only open up a couple of days at a time online because we have to make sure vaccine is available. We will be posting more slots online soon,” noted Jennifer King, North Georgia Health District public information officer.
More details on the state’s vaccine locations and appointments can be found online at Georgia.gov/Covid-Vaccine.