People trying to ‘jump the line’ for coronavirus vaccine, health official says

This story was updated at 9:01 p.m. on January 21, 2021 to include comments from two state officials.

While residents of Montgomery County pass on registration links for appointments for the COVID-19 vaccine, people who are not yet eligible are registering for appointments, only to be refused at clinics.

County health official Dr Travis Gayles told a press briefing on Thursday that officials are investigating how the link has been distributed and how many people are registered although they have not yet eligible.

Access to the link allowed some people to “skip the line” to schedule an appointment, which will not be tolerated, in order to preserve a “fair and equitable” deployment, Gayles said.

On Wednesday morning, several residents who were at least 75 years old or who worked in ineligible industries were turned away from at least one clinic because they signed up for appointments, but are not eligible for Phase 1A . Gayles did not name the clinic.

The county divided the distribution of vaccine doses into phases, each with priority groups. These groups are then divided into levels.

Currently, only people eligible to receive a Phase 1A vaccine can register for an appointment. In phase 1A, 50,000 to 60,000 people in the county are eligible.

The county has opened pre-registration to residents aged 75 and over, who are at Level 1 of Phase 1B.

Pre-registration allows people to submit information about their eligibility and contact details. Once the county accepts the information and opens appointments for older Level 1 residents of Phase 1B, the county will send them a registration link for the appointments.

More than 68,000 people aged 75 and over were pre-registered Thursday afternoon. About 75,000 people are eligible in this age group in the county.

People who are not in phase 1A or who are at least 75 years old should not yet pre-register. They must wait for the county to begin their pre-registration process.

Once eligibility opens for pre-registration for the other levels of Phase 1B and for Phase 1C, the county will open registration portals for these groups.

Gayles said people who sign up for appointments and are not eligible may be able to withdraw seats from people at greater risk of contracting COVID-19 or having more severe symptoms if they catch the virus.

“We recognize that some people just did what they saw fit because someone sent them a link,” he said. “But I will say this very clearly to anyone who scrupulously uses the links or tries to sign up in advance: we will have zero tolerance for this behavior.”

Unauthorized registrations for appointments are slowing the county’s vaccine distribution process, he said.

There is a prioritization system because of a limited supply of doses and to ensure that those with a greater risk of exposure will be vaccinated first, he said.

County officials have urged residents to be patient. They noted that the doses sent by the state are completely or almost exhausted each week before the next distribution.

The state receives 72,000 to 74,000 doses per week, then allocates and distributes them among local hospitals and health services.

Montgomery County received 11,900 doses on Tuesday – 7,300 for the first doses and 4,600 for the second doses. The vaccines require two doses given three to four weeks apart.

“The state does not have the capacity to give us more vaccines because they themselves are not getting more vaccines,” County Director Marc Elrich said on Tuesday. “This is a very limited offer and we are going through it as quickly as possible.”

County officials typically find out how many doses they will receive from the state each week over the weekend, Elrich said, but this week they were told on Monday – a day before the shipment was received. .

It’s hard to plan and schedule clinic appointments when you “don’t know what you’re going to get until the day before you get them,” Elrich said.

The county has received approximately 27,000 initial doses of the vaccine to date.

“We need a larger allocation from the state to match our population. We pre-register so that once we have the vaccine and we can start vaccinating [Phase] 1B, we can arrange the appointments, ”Elrich said.

Regular updates are sent to residents who sign up for alerts. A 30-person call center will soon be set up to help residents register and ask questions.

Some have been confused by Gov. Larry Hogan’s announcements opening up eligibility in Maryland to certain groups before the county was ready to accept those groups, Elrich said. He added that he believes the governor is considering opening up eligibility to residents aged 65 to 74.

“He’s going to create a group that thinks they’re immediately eligible for the vaccine,” Elrich said. “They are eligible, but it does not increase the amount of vaccine beyond 7,000 new doses.

“I can move you in a line. I can put you in a situation where you weren’t before, but that doesn’t mean you’re going to get vaccinated any faster unless the number of vaccines we get actually increases.

Elrich said about 1.8 million residents of the state are eligible for the vaccine in phases 1A, 1B and 1C, but only 300,000 have been vaccinated so far.

“That leaves 1.5 million people to share 72,000 vaccines per week. It’s going to take a while, ”he says. “There are reasons to hope. There are new businesses that will likely get approval [for vaccines] within a month or so. “

Charlie Gischlar, a spokesperson for the state’s health department, wrote in an email Thursday evening that Montgomery County has received the most doses of the vaccine of any county health department.

“Their distribution continues to be fair and equitable based on their share of the population,” he wrote.

He provided a list of the number of first doses the county has received in the past four expeditions:
• Week 3: 4,200
• Week 4: 8,600
• Week 5: 6,700
• Week 6: 7,300

Elrich criticized the state for failing to release Hogan’s announcements in advance and for including local officials in the planning process for state-released immunization information and vaccine distributions.

“We received no notice when he announced that [Phase] 1B – seniors – are now eligible without our being able to adjust our systems to deal with it, using a state system that does not take into account where we were in terms of immunizing people in [Phase] 1A, which was the governor’s initial priority, ”he said. “We are not able to plan with them.”

Elrich said state information on the county’s vaccinations initially listed a phone number for Gayles’ office number and directed them to the county’s website when the county had not opened pre-registration for residents. aged 75 and over at the time.

“This is where we sit down a few days in advance, letting us know what they want to do and asking what we’re ready to do, asking what our systems look like right now – so we would have been able to plan for an orderly deployment of this, ”Elrich said. “That’s all we ask.

“I’m not asking [Hogan] to make vaccines. We just want his departments to work with us, so we’re all coordinated with each other, and that’s what we are not right now.

Asked by Bethesda Beat for comments on criticism and concerns by county officials about the state, Mike Ricci, a spokesperson for Hogan, wrote in an email Thursday night that not all of the statements were made. were not true.

“I have contacted county officials directly to discuss this, as a number of things here are wrong,” he wrote, referring to a list of questions in an email.

Bethesda Beat specifically asked about comments from officials regarding state communication with the county, county involvement in planning, state management of the deployment, and issues with the vaccine nomination system. of State.

When asked if the county is considering easing restrictions on restaurants in the county, as some jurisdictions in the region are doing, Elrich said the county was not yet where it needed to be.

But when those restrictions are lifted, there will most likely be a limit to how long each guest can be seated as a table, he said.

Briana Adhikusuma can be contacted at [email protected].