Smokers in Indiana May Get COVID Vaccine Before Teachers Due to Change in State Guidelines

Indiana state health officials are allowing smokers on COVID-19 vaccine waiting lists rather than teachers, angering school professionals.

“According to [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention], smokers and people with severe obesity are at a higher risk of serious illness or death and may therefore be considered for the waiting list, ”a spokesperson for the state health department said. of Indiana (ISDH) in an email to WISH-TV in response to “We are following CDC recommendations.”

Indiana counties will each be responsible for deciding whether or not to allow smokers on vaccine waiting lists – and that decision doesn’t mean that if someone is a smoker, they can just schedule a date. for an online vaccine. The state still only administers its doses to key age groups, healthcare workers and first responders.

But the state’s decision has an impact on who can sign up for vaccine waitlists to receive remaining doses – and Indiana tightened control over vaccine waitlists during the month . In a January 30 letter to vaccination sites, Indiana Chief Medical Officer Dr Lindsay Weaver ordered vaccination sites to cancel and warn anyone who was falsely told they qualified. and were placed on a waiting list.

This impacted a number of teachers in Indiana, who had signed up on waiting lists to receive unused vaccines and avoid waste, WFYI reported. Since teachers are not officially eligible for vaccines in Indiana, a number of teachers have recently been taken off waiting lists. ISDH said these teachers were moved to the bottom of the list because their professional category is not officially considered a priority group of the state and therefore they are not eligible to receive vaccines. Only teachers over the age of 60 would be eligible.

Now that smokers have been given priority status on waiting lists ahead of them, teachers are even more upset, especially as schools are looking to reopen as soon as possible.

“We find it extremely frustrating that the Indiana State Department of Health continues to choose from the CDC’s recommendations, when it very clearly states that educators should get vaccinated now,” Jennifer Smith-Margraf , vice president of the Indiana State Teachers Association told WISH-TV.

Starting from its February 19 guidelines, the CDC classifies teachers, support staff and child care workers as “essential front-line workers.” Indiana has not yet followed suit.

The ISDH also denied a statement that it wasted vaccines by removing teachers from waiting lists: “We ask every clinic to keep a waiting list of people who meet current eligibility requirements in order to that each dose could be administered, and only a hundredth of the doses we received were wasted, mainly due to a broken vial or syringe. “

The scientific community has agreed on evidence showing that smokers are a priority group for protection against COVID-19. Habitual smoking is associated with a high chance of hospitalization and death from COVID-19, according to a study from the Cleveland Clinic published in January in the JAMA Internal Medicine newspaper. Another study published in November by the University of California, Los Angeles found COVID-19 to be worsened in the airways of smokers. Other researchers have found that smoking can weaken the body’s immune response and increase the risk that a patient may need a lung transplant if they are seriously ill, USA today reported.

Newsweek has contacted the ISDH for comments on its updated vaccine waiting lists.