[ad_1]
The last pictures were taken around 3:45 am, in the street, with literally no time to waste.
Throughout the night, staff and volunteers from the Swedish health services in Seattle had rushed to administer hundreds of doses of the coronavirus vaccine that were due to expire early in the morning after a freezer malfunction. In the end, they only had a few dozen hits left and about 15 minutes to put them in people’s arms.
“We were literally like… Who can bring people here? People started texting and calling and we were just counting down,” said Kevin Brooks, Swedish director of operations, who helped to coordinate everything in their clinic at the University of Seattle. “Thirty-seven. Thirty five. Thirty-three … People were walking up and down the hall.
By the last shots, staff and volunteers were running down the road on a cold night, at one point, stabbing someone through a car window, Brooks said. An elderly woman in flip flops was pictured rolling her sleeve on the sidewalk as the clock struck.
It was a familiar story: Faced with the expiration of vials, health workers dispense doses of vaccine at full speed, sometimes to whom they can find. These impromptu giveaways have at times been controversial, with the vaccines wasted and out of turn sparking anger. Officials are juggling strict plans to prioritize the most vulnerable with the urgency to vaccinate as many people as possible as quickly as possible against a deadly virus.
In the end, none of the more than 1,600 doses set to expire in Seattle were wasted, health officials said, after a colossal rush that showed both the enormous strain on those that immunize millions of Americans and the hope that these vaccine doses have brought. The deployment of gunfire across the country has been plagued by bottlenecks, frustration and disagreements over who should get protection first. But Thursday night and Friday morning were full of purpose and joy, with enthusiastic people lined up in their pajamas, frantic activity and at one point a happy birthday rendition.
From the early days of the pandemic, Brooks said, “We’re on the front lines of this problem, and it’s been a long year. And now we also take on the great blessing and burden of immunizing the community.
“The term we use is, we are tired and we are inspired,” he said. “And these two things are true at the same time.”
The race started around 9 p.m., as officials from Swedish and another group, UW Medicine, learned that a refrigeration issue had caused doses to thaw at Kaiser Permanente.
Jenny Brackett, assistant administrator at UW Medicine, was relaxing overnight at home when the news arrived. She said she had just read about another group that rushed to use vaccine doses that expired days earlier. Stranded on a closed freeway with little time to spare, Oregon health care workers began shooting other drivers amid a snowstorm.
“When I got the call, they were like, ‘This is kind of like our snow moment,’” said Brackett.
“I knew we could get the vaccinators there,” she said. “So I had every confidence in that element. I knew our nursing team would be successful.” Brackett was ready to go to the hospital around 10 p.m., she said, and their vaccine doses arrived about an hour later.
“I was kind of like, how are we going to get 800 people to show up, you know, at 10 or 11 at night?” she says. “But it turned out to be no problem, because, you know, the word went out like wildfire.”
Officials say they did their best to administer the vaccines to people who needed to be vaccinated early. This meant high-risk healthcare workers and first responders, residents and nursing home staff, as well as people 65 or older and people 50 or older living in multigenerational households.
“URGENT: We have 588 DOSE 1 MODERNA appointments available from January 28, 11:00 p.m. to January 29, 2:00 a.m.,” the Swedish hospital tweeted at 10:59 p.m. PT, with a link to the time slots, limiting enrollment to priority groups already authorized to receive the vaccine.
At UW Medical Center-Northwest, people like Brackett called out to people 65 and older, walking in a line of hundreds of people meandering through the hallways and then spilling outside.
“I was a little worried that the line might not be too excited,” she said. “You know, I let the others start. But that’s not the response I got at all. In fact, the crowd kind of cheered.”
And at all sites, officials and employees said workers were calling union leaders, police and firefighters, even their local grocery stores in an attempt to target doses – if they couldn’t access immunization levels. current, at least they could alert. the following people online.
In the end, many pictures went to the general public. “The overriding rule was not to waste anything,” said Cassie Sauer, president of the Washington State Hospital Association, who said she sent updates to the governor’s office and public health officials. all through the night.
To some observers, the overnight success in Seattle seemed like proof that the country’s immunization process could go faster. “Idea: vaccinate with this level of urgency all the time,” one reporter tweeted.
Sauer said it wasn’t that easy, at least for now.
“My father is 80 and has Parkinson’s disease and he has mobility issues,” she says. “He can’t stand in line for hours waiting for a vaccine. He needs an appointment.”
“I think it works as a kind of one-time emergency, and it could work when we get to where we really do mainstream vaccines,” she added. “But right now … I think we also need to think strategically about equity.”
Esmy Jimenez, a 27-year-old journalist, was covering the battle on Thursday night but also managed to secure a photo. Towards the end, she called her best friend, former roommate and fellow journalists as staff told her their last doses were about to expire.
“Get in your car now,” she ordered.
Carolyn Grant, a longtime nurse leader at UW Medicine, came to volunteer for the rapid vaccinations. She was out of retirement last March for several months to help with drive test sites, “monitoring the numbers across the country every day.”
On Thursday night, she was delighted to see so many people flocking to the vaccine that others in the United States – still skeptical – were refusing.
At 64 and a half, Grant narrowly missed the cut for the last level of immunization. By 1 a.m., however, she said, the queue had shrunk and she was shot.
[ad_2]
Source link