Illinois 'Sprinted Past' Other States, Leads U.S. In Vaccinations

CHICAGO — About one in ten coronavirus vaccines administered in the United States so far have been given to health care workers in Illinois, according to state and federal officials.

As of Tuesday night, a total of 100,991 doses had been administered in Illinois since the state's first shots were administered last week, Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced Wednesday.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a total of 1,008,025 vaccines have been administered nationwide. Another nearly 8.4 million doses have been distributed across the country but not yet injected as of Wednesday morning.

Pritzker praised the work of state and local public health, emergency management and hospital teams in "maximizing efficiency and minimizing waste" during the first phase of the rollout of the first coronavirus vaccine.

"Their success is a win for all of us," Pritzker said. "By sheer population, California is three times our size, and Texas is two and a half times our size, so they will eventually outpace us in sheer numbers at some point this week. But the vaccine team in Illinois sprinted past them all in week one."

There are about 700,000 health care workers in Illinois covered under Phase 1a of CDC recommendations, which also includes about 110,000 nursing home residents plus their staff, according to the governor.

The agency's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, or ACIP, has released an interim recommendation for who will be eligible for vaccines in Phase 1b. It includes everyone over the age of 75, as well as essential workers who risk exposure. They include firefighters, police and correctional officers, grocery store, public transit and postal workers, child care workers and those who work in the education sector.

While the state is not bound by the committee's recommendations, Pritzker said it was a highly regarded group of experts, and his administration would probably abide by their direction.

"We think their recommendations are very important for us to pay attention to and, likely, to follow," he said. "There are some things that they are silent on within their recommendations, and so there are decisions that need to be made within those. And that's why, after ACIP gives recommendations, you'll see what the Illinois implementation of that will look like."

This week's allocation of vaccine doses includes 15,600 for Chicago and 23,400 for the rest of the state, the governor said. Another 37,050 doses are set aside for CVS and Walgreens to begin providing the vaccine to nursing home residents, which is expected to begin next week in Illinois.

Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike said public health officials were committed to getting vaccines to long-term care facilities, even those that are not covered under the companies' contract with the federal government.

"Sometimes there were some minor qualifications that they looked for that maybe a facility didn't meet, but the point is that they are 1a regardless," Ezike said. "So whether the vaccination is done by a pharmacy partner — CVS or Walgreens — whether it's done by a different pharmacy, whether it's done by the local health department, whether it's done by a strike team that goes in, all of those facilities will be done at the top of this order and will be done before we move on to these other phases that follow."

As the state reported 135 new deaths and more than 6,700 new coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours, Ezike said she would be making plans for next year with the hope that many of the people who are alive today are still alive once the state gets back to normal.

"Yes, there is a long road to go, but we are truly at the beginning of the end. There's still road to cover, but we have to, have to, have to stay the course," she said. "We can't let people who made it this far not make it to the finish line. We've gone too far to turn back now."

Celebrating the holidays at home with members of your households, she said, is the best way to avoid another surge in new infections, hospitalizations and deaths.

"And I know it sounds crazy to ask that yet again, and I know that some of you will, and I know that some of you won't or can't," she said. "For those of you: I ask you to think of additional safety measures that you can employ as you travel, as you gather that can make the visits somewhat safer."

Pritzker also said the first doses of the Moderna vaccine arrived Wednesday. Local public health departments and health care providers are expected to receive the rest of the state's first 174,600 doses Thursday.

While the Pfizer vaccine must be stored in ultra-cold freezers at -94 degrees and requires a second dose three weeks after the initial jab, the Moderna vaccine, approved Friday, has a longer shelf-life and can be kept in a standard freezer. It also requires two doses, administered four weeks apart.

The governor said state public health officials are reviewing the recommendations of the CDC committee in the context of data from Illinois and will provide an update in the new year. But it will be "weeks and weeks and weeks" before the state can move to Phase 1b, he said.

"I would just say that patience is the watchword," he said. "We're going to see, over the next couple of months, recommendations coming out from ACIP and worked on in the state of Illinois and across the country to deliver vaccines to everybody. But we certainly are very hopeful that we'll get to the general population sooner rather than later."