Pritzker's Stats Obsession Will Intensify Vaccine Hunger Games

CHICAGO — Gov. J.B. Pritzker's newest pandemic policy sets the stage for diabetic teenagers battling grandmas to score a spot in line for coronavirus vaccine shots that aren't available yet.

It's such a bad idea that it brought together bitter political rivals, Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, to keep that from happening in the city and suburbs, where there's about enough COVID-19 vaccine to inoculate around 5 percent of the 1.6 million people currently eligible to get shots.

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Lightfoot and Preckwinkle issued a rare joint statement that said, and I paraphrase: Thanks, but no thanks, J.B.

The Black women leading the most populous city and county in the state have enough problems without the governor's random edict that makes a million additional people eligible for already jam-packed virtual vaccine lines — a move that arguably would make it easier for obese white kids to get shots before old folks, essential workers and people living in poor, minority communities hardest hit by COVID-19.

And they told him so — nicely, of course: "We recognize the Governor must make tough choices and consider needs across this diverse state, but given the limited supply of vaccine, we must also make the tough choices."

Let me put it another way: They're not going to abide by the whim of a governor responding to a growing number of news outlets that finally started calling out his bogus claim that Illinois' vaccine rollout is "going quite well."

Pritzker's positive assessment of Illinois' vaccine rollout has been nothing short of statistical sleight of hand intended to mislead Illinoisans on how things are going.

But statistics show Illinois has lagged in getting vaccine shots in arms, as folks read here first.

And despite being called out on poor planning, lacking oversight and "Hunger Games" sign-up systems that put Illinois at the bottom of the heap of states struggling with vaccine rollout, Pritzker continues to spout statistical calculations that skirt the truth.

On Wednesday, when Pritzker finally faced the public after a long Super Bowl weekend, he announced what might be his most misleading vaccine rollout statistic yet.

"Over the last week," our statistics-obsessed governor said, Illinois became "No. 1" among the "top 10 most populous states" in the nation for "per capita vaccination."

Then, without collaborating with local leaders charged with managing local vaccinations, Pritzker announced that later this month he'd open up so-called "Phase 1b" appointments to anybody old enough to drive with health conditions, such as diabetes and obesity, that might contribute to more serious COVID-19 complications.

Why has the governor make a sudden decision to follow updated Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance that is more than a month old?

Could it be — statistics?

The Associated Press reported that Louisiana, South Dakota, North Dakota, New Hampshire, Montana, Virginia and Florida have made people with high-risk medical conditions eligible for vaccines. Last week, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo followed suit.

All those states have administered higher percentages of received vaccine doses than Illinois — which has only fully vaccinated 2.6 percent of the population. That's only better than five states.

MORE ON PATCH: Lies, Damned Lies and Gov. Pritzker's COVID-19 Vaccine Statistics

The trouble, it seems, is that Pritzker's obsession with coronavirus statistics and how Illinois stacks up against the most populous states, as he calls them, doesn't take into account what's actually happening in local jurisdictions dealing with a frustrating bottleneck caused by high demand for vaccine and low supply of shots.

I figure that's why Chicago's public health commissioner, Dr. Alison Arwady, on Wednesday took a calming breath and wore a facial expression best described as frustrated befuddlement before answering a question about the governor's edict.

Arwady, for those who don't know, is an epidemiologist with a resume packed with pandemic experience.

I was told that she had learned of the governor's new vaccination strategy — and objections to it that went ignored — just hours before Pritzker broke the major vaccine news, which he delivered without the state's top doctor, Dr. Ngozi Ezike, by his side.

Arwady always impresses me with how she responds to questions about coronavirus policy dictated by a governor exposed for being guided by politics and public opinion rather than science and data.

"Of course I would like more people to be vaccinated," Arwady said.

The thing standing in the way, though, is a little thing called reality.

Expanding the vaccine pool without an exponential increase in the 6,000 shots a day sent to Chicago would only make it more difficult to inoculate people already eligible by diluting the amount available to folks over 65 and folks living minority communities hardest hit by COVID-19, Arwady said.

Now, if Pritzker's administration knew something she didn't — "assurance there will be some additional vaccine, and they can direct it toward Chicago," for instance — that's a conversation worth having. But that conversation never happened.

The governor has made vague claims that he knows how much more vaccine Illinois will get from the federal government in the next three weeks. Pritzker's spokesperson didn't respond to repeated requests for information about the governor's claim more vaccine is on the way.

"I want to be really careful about not opening up the number of people eligible for vaccine when I don’t have anywhere near enough vaccine," Arwady said Wednesday.

Pritzker exhibits no such caution.

On Thursday, I asked Preckwinkle if she was worried the governor's decision to make more people eligible for the same number of vaccines — about 1,000 a day in Cook County — without consulting her, and if it would create even more problems for an already-overwhelmed vaccine booking system.

After a contemplative pause, Preckwinkle explained it this way: "Both our website and our call center have been inundated with calls from people who are anxious to be vaccinated, and that was prior to the governor's announcement. That's all I'll say."

That's the pandemic reality for folks living in a state where our governor acts alone, without consulting the most qualified public health experts — not to mention the Black women elected to represent the most populous corner of our state.

Thank goodness Lightfoot and Preckwinkle set aside their differences to ignore Pritzker.

Our grandmas are more important than statistics.

Mark Konkol, recipient of the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for local reporting, wrote and produced the Peabody Award-winning series, "Time: The Kalief Browder Story." He was a producer, writer and narrator for the "Chicagoland" docu-series on CNN, and a consulting producer on the Showtime documentary, "16 Shots."

More from Mark Konkol:

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• Lies, Damned Lies and Gov. Pritzker's COVID-19 Vaccine Statistics
• CTU Shadow PAC Pushes Pritzker To 'Intervene' In CPS Stalemate
• IL Ranks No. 47 In Vaccine Percentage, Pritzker No. 1 In Excuses