53,037 Fully Vaccinated Against COVID-19 In Will County

WILL COUNTY, IL — More than 53,000 people in Will County were fully vaccinated against the coronavirus by Wednesday, according to data from the Illinois Department of Public Health. That represents about 7.66 percent of the county's total population.

156,498 total doses were administered in the county by Wednesday, which has a population of 692,310, according to data from the Illinois Department of Public Health. The state also shares data on its vaccine inventory, and the reported inventory for Will County is 38,622, with 13,478 of the reported inventory at the local health department, and 25,144 at community partner sites.

The county administered its highest number of doses on Feb. 24, when 6,523 doses were given, the state's data shows. The county currently has a seven-day average of 4,573 doses administered.

Patch reported earlier this week that Will County officials are questioning the amount of vaccines the county is receiving.

During a board meeting Wednesday, Sue Olenek, the executive director of the Will County Health Department, talked about the discrepancy in the number of doses they have received in relation to the county's population.

"With Will County being an extremely high-population county in Illinois, it's really unusual that we would be provided with such little vaccine," she said.

Will County ranks fifth in terms of doses administered, trailing Chicago, and Cook and DuPage and Lake counties. Comparatively, Chicago has fully vaccinated 8.42 percent of its population, Cook County is at 9.80 percent, DuPage is at 10.13 percent, and Lake County is at 7.86 percent.

Olenek said that after reaching out to her counterpart in DuPage County, she learned that they received larger shipments. Even though DuPage County has a larger population than Will County, by more than 200,000 people, it's managed to vaccinate a higher percentage of its residents.

More than 3.5 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine have been administered statewide, IDPH data shows. About 349,000 doses were given to residents and staff at Illinois long-term-care facilities through a federal program run by CVS and Walgreens.

Will County remains in Phase 1B of the state's vaccination plan, which includes residents 65 and older, those who work as first responders, K-12 education workers, food and agriculture, manufacturing, corrections workers and inmates, USPS workers, public transit workers, grocery store workers, and staff at shelters and day cares.

Patch editor Abhinanda Datta contributed to this report.