Teachers Eligible For COVID Vaccine
Posted: Wed Feb 17, 2021 12:35 pm
Starting Feb 24. From WRAL
By Matthew Burns, WRAL.com senior producer/politics editor
RALEIGH, N.C. — With the push on to reopen schools across North Carolina, teachers are being given a higher priority to get vaccinated against coronavirus.
Gov. Roy Cooper said Wednesday that all K-12 school personnel and anyone who works in child care will be eligible for vaccinations beginning Feb. 24. All other frontline "essential" workers, such as police officers, firefighters and grocery workers, will have to wait until March 10 to start getting vaccinated.
The state has administered nearly 1.5 million shots over the past two months, meaning about 10.6 percent of state residents have had at least one dose of the two-dose regimen. About 3.5 percent of the state is fully vaccinated.
Group 1: Heath care workers and long-term care staff and residents
Group 2: Those 65 and older
Group 3a: Educators – teachers, support staff, child care workers
Group 3b: Frontline "essential" workers -- first responders (firefighters, police), food and agriculture production, manufacturing, corrections workers, U.S. Postal Service workers, public transit workers and grocery workers
Group 4: Adults at high risk for exposure and at increased risk for serious illness
Group 5: Everyone else
North Carolina receives only 150,000 doses of vaccine each week from the federal government, and the state has about 240,000 public school personnel.
Previously, state officials said they had no plans to break Group 3 into smaller units and prioritize some professions over others. But Cooper said putting teachers at the front of Group 3 was simply pragmatic.
"There has been concern about all of these essential frontline workers in a big group, in Group 3, all of a sudden crashing into the system, that that would be problematic," he said. "Starting with a smaller number of Group 3 frontline essential workers helps providers streamline vaccine distribution."
Group 3 could be further subdivided in the coming weeks, depending on the flow of vaccine into the state, the governor said.
"This essential worker category is much more complicated because it's a lot of people who are doing very important frontline jobs," he said. "The [state's] health care team is going to look at ... whether they can open up all of the [Group 3] categories or whether they have to go to another subpart."
Dr. Mandy Cohen, secretary of the state Department of Health and Human Services, said the prospect of a third vaccine being approved in the coming weeks could allow the bulk of Group 3 to be eligible at the same time without breaking out other professions separately.
By Matthew Burns, WRAL.com senior producer/politics editor
RALEIGH, N.C. — With the push on to reopen schools across North Carolina, teachers are being given a higher priority to get vaccinated against coronavirus.
Gov. Roy Cooper said Wednesday that all K-12 school personnel and anyone who works in child care will be eligible for vaccinations beginning Feb. 24. All other frontline "essential" workers, such as police officers, firefighters and grocery workers, will have to wait until March 10 to start getting vaccinated.
The state has administered nearly 1.5 million shots over the past two months, meaning about 10.6 percent of state residents have had at least one dose of the two-dose regimen. About 3.5 percent of the state is fully vaccinated.
Group 1: Heath care workers and long-term care staff and residents
Group 2: Those 65 and older
Group 3a: Educators – teachers, support staff, child care workers
Group 3b: Frontline "essential" workers -- first responders (firefighters, police), food and agriculture production, manufacturing, corrections workers, U.S. Postal Service workers, public transit workers and grocery workers
Group 4: Adults at high risk for exposure and at increased risk for serious illness
Group 5: Everyone else
North Carolina receives only 150,000 doses of vaccine each week from the federal government, and the state has about 240,000 public school personnel.
Previously, state officials said they had no plans to break Group 3 into smaller units and prioritize some professions over others. But Cooper said putting teachers at the front of Group 3 was simply pragmatic.
"There has been concern about all of these essential frontline workers in a big group, in Group 3, all of a sudden crashing into the system, that that would be problematic," he said. "Starting with a smaller number of Group 3 frontline essential workers helps providers streamline vaccine distribution."
Group 3 could be further subdivided in the coming weeks, depending on the flow of vaccine into the state, the governor said.
"This essential worker category is much more complicated because it's a lot of people who are doing very important frontline jobs," he said. "The [state's] health care team is going to look at ... whether they can open up all of the [Group 3] categories or whether they have to go to another subpart."
Dr. Mandy Cohen, secretary of the state Department of Health and Human Services, said the prospect of a third vaccine being approved in the coming weeks could allow the bulk of Group 3 to be eligible at the same time without breaking out other professions separately.