Maine Med to Begin Vaccinating Patients 70 Years and Over

Heather Mea-Clark prepares doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine at a clinic Thursday in Bay Square, an assisted living community in Yarmouth. Derek Davis / Staff Photographer

Maine’s COVID-19 mass vaccination program for people 70 and over is getting closer to launch, with a large health network sending patient notifications on Thursday that vaccinations would begin within two weeks.

The Mills administration on Wednesday changed the state’s schedule to give people aged 70 and over a higher priority to receive vaccinations. These changes are already having an impact on the rollout, with MaineHealth messaging more than 300,000 patients on Thursday to let them know that it plans to start scheduling COVID-19 vaccine appointments for those 70 and over as soon as possible. next week.

As the state rushes to vaccinate people, Maine reported 808 new cases of COVID-19 and eight more deaths on Thursday.

It was the second day in a row that new cases surpassed 800. On Wednesday, Maine recorded 824 new cases, a new record. Overall, Maine has reported 31,958 COVID-19 cases and 461 deaths. About 85 percent of all deaths in Maine from COVID-19 have been among those aged 70 and older.

“We expect to receive gunshots in the arms of people 70 and over by the end of the month,” said John Porter, a spokesperson for MaineHealth. MaineHealth is the parent company of Maine Medical Center in Portland and operates an extensive network of primary care practices throughout much of the state, particularly in southern Maine. An email from Dr Joan Boomsma, chief medical officer at MaineHealth, told patients that vaccine appointments were coming soon.

While not quite ready, MaineHealth will soon be setting up a call center for patients 70 and older to schedule appointments, and is working with the state on online scheduling, a Porter said. Appointments will be made on a first come, first served basis for people aged 70 and over whose doctors are part of the MaineHealth network.

MaineHealth will release more information about its plans in the future, and patients shouldn’t be calling their doctors for appointments now.

All vaccinations will take place at stand-alone clinics set up by MaineHealth strictly for COVID-19 vaccinations, Porter said. The vaccine will not be administered in primary care practices for logistical reasons.

“We are working to increase our vaccination capacity,” he said. These 70 and over represent approximately 193,000 of Maine’s 1.3 million people.

Northern Light Health’s Dr James Jarvis said his healthcare network is developing an online process and call center to serve patients 70 and over who want to schedule a vaccination. Details on how this program will work should be available early next week, Jarvis said.

“We don’t yet know what our vaccine allocation will be to immunize people over 70, but we are confident that we will remain effective and administer whatever we receive,” Jarvis said in a statement Thursday evening. “In addition, we are a long way from helping the state set up large-scale clinics to immunize the general public following the state’s phased approach.”

Northern Light has not received the vaccine doses needed to start the next round of vaccinations, but will notify its patients as soon as it is ready to begin.

InterMed, which serves more than 100,000 patients in Greater Portland from its offices in Portland, South Portland and Yarmouth, will begin offering vaccinations to its oldest and most vulnerable patients next week, according to spokesperson John Lamb. InterMed will continue to immunize frontline healthcare workers.

“We anticipate that the volume of vaccines available will increase in the coming weeks and we will continue to work on our patient lists as quickly as possible,” wrote Dan Loiselle, InterMed’s medical director, in a vaccination update sent. to InterMed patients on Thursday.

“Many of you have called to ask for updates,” Loiselle wrote. “I wish I could provide you with a better schedule. The federal government plans to dramatically increase the number of doses released, but at the moment, we are taking it week after week.

Central Maine Healthcare is finalizing plans to expand vaccinations, according to a statement from John Alexander, chief medical officer. Central Maine Healthcare serves 400,000 patients in central, western and central Maine. It operates the Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston, Bridgton Hospital and Rumford Hospital.

“We are delighted to begin vaccinating our first responders, public safety and critical response personnel and pleased that Maine’s most vulnerable residents are a priority as part of the state’s updated strategy,” said said Alexander. “We worked on logistics, including staffing, locations and appointment scheduling systems, based on eligibility criteria. We plan to announce the details shortly. “

More details of the state’s updated vaccination plan are expected next week.
But the ability of Maine and other states to scale up vaccinations depends on an increase in doses from the Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed.

Robert Long, spokesperson for the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said Maine is expected to receive an additional 100 doses of the vaccine next week, which means the state will receive 17,275 doses. Weekly doses have hovered around 17,000 in recent weeks.

Dr Nirav Shah, director of the Maine CDC, said the state needs to receive 50,000 doses per week of Operation Warp Speed ​​to prevent supply issues hampering vaccine deployment.

Maine will receive an additional $ 89 million in federal funds to fight the pandemic, including $ 12 million for the COVID-19 vaccination program and $ 77 million for testing, contact tracing and other strategies, a the state congressional delegation said Thursday in a joint announcement. The $ 89 million was Maine’s share of a $ 50.8 billion deal in Congress last month for COVID-19 aid to states.

“Amid this unprecedented economic and public health crisis, it is critical that Mainers can access COVID-19 vaccines and tests,” the Sens statement said. Susan Collins, Republican, Angus King, an Independent, and Representatives Chellie Pingree, D-1st District, and Jared Golden, D-2nd District. “This significant investment will help keep communities healthy and safe by increasing the availability of testing and promoting the efficient distribution of vaccines throughout our state.

In Maine, the seven-day daily average of new cases climbed to 618.1 on Thursday, from 520.4 just three days ago, 490 a week ago and 387.3 a month ago.

The new vaccination plan also moves public security officers into the current vaccination phase.

The current vaccination program is in Phase 1A, which includes healthcare workers, paramedics, and nursing home staff and residents, but it will soon add public safety workers as well as police officers. So far, 66,487 COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered, 56,355 first doses and 10,132 second doses.

Phase 1B, which includes people aged 70 and over, is expected to start soon and can be launched even before Phase 1A is complete.

Also moved to Phase 1B, which includes essential frontline workers like teachers and postal workers, those who manufacture, distribute, or process COVID-19 tests.

There are currently 193 people hospitalized for COVID-19 in Maine, including 63 in intensive care. The eight deaths included three residents of Penobscot County, two of York County, two of Cumberland County and one of Aroostook County. Of the deaths, five were women and three were men. Six of the deaths were in people 80 and older, while two of the deceased were 70 years old.

Editor Dennis Hoey contributed to this report.

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