Smokers now take priority in deployment of COVID-19 vaccine in New Jersey

• New Jersey announced Thursday that it will begin vaccinating people aged 65 and over and those with underlying health conditions against the coronavirus.
• Smoking is one of those health issues that is now propelling New Jersey residents to the fore.
• Only people aged 75 and over and essential workers have been recommended to be next on the list, but US officials recently urged states to expand their eligibility.
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Officials are scrambling to speed up COVID-19 vaccinations across the United States, but a complex set of guidelines about who should take priority has hampered states’ efforts to maximize the number of gun shots.

In order to speed up the deployment, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said on Tuesday that states should expand the pool of people who have priority access. That pool should now include Americans between the ages of 16 and 64 who have certain underlying health conditions that increase the risk of developing severe COVID-19, he said.

As a result, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy ad that the state will expand vaccine eligibility in line with Azar’s recommendations starting Thursday.

The move will put the state’s two million cigarette smokers to the front of the vaccination line, alongside people with other high-risk medical conditions, including obesity, type 2 diabetes and

heart disease
.

“Nicotine is one of the most powerful addictions. Smoking puts people at a higher risk of more serious illnesses. If an individual who smokes contracts COVID, they become sicker much faster,” said Donna Leusner , director of communications for the State Department of Health. in a statement Thursday.

“Our goal is to save as many lives as possible and to promote immunization among high risk groups,” she added.

In New Jersey, smokers can get vaccinated before teachers

Kirsten Luce / Pool via Reuters

New Jersey’s decision to expand its priority vaccine pool means smokers can now get vaccinated alongside healthcare workers, police and firefighters, and residents 65 and older.

The move also catapults people with a history or current smoking habit in front of teachers and public transport workers in the state.

According to CDC guidelines, essential workers should be among the following, although ultimately individual states decide how to distribute their vaccine quotas. States like New York are already vaccinating teachers.

Governor Murphy’s announcement sparked an uproar on social media, with people pointing out that smokers now have a high priority over essential workers, who are disproportionately people of color.

—Joel Eden, PhD (@joeleden) January 14, 2021

According to Kristen Ehresmann, director of infectious disease epidemiology, prevention and control for the Minnesota Department of Health, expanding the priority pool may be more difficult than it is worth.

“There would be efficiency gains, but there would be significant losses” in terms of vaccine equity and racial justice, she told STAT.

No proof required

Mark Lennihan / Pool via REUTERS

NJ Health Department Commissioner Judy Persichilli told a press conference on Wednesday that the state will not ask for proof that people smoke if they show up for a shot.

“No documentation on health status or your age will be required,” she said.

Twitter users joked that New Jersey’s lax guidelines around eligibility for the new vaccine provided an easy opportunity to get the shot.

—Brandon Hoffman (@BrandonHoffmanC) January 14, 2021

The expanded priority pool means four and a half million New Jersey residents – about half the state’s population – are now eligible for a vaccine.

In addition to the state’s two million smokers, that group includes one and a half million residents aged 65 and older, and up to one million people with other health conditions, according to Persichilli.

New Jersey administered only about 288,000 doses on Thursday – about 6.5% of the now eligible population – and the state only received 731,000 doses, according to the Washington Post.

States cannot immunize everyone who is now eligible

While not all states have followed Azar’s recent instructions (Florida and Texas opened vaccination to residents over 65 at the end of December), this expansion of the priority vaccine pool of United States means that a state is unlikely to be able to immunize all of its eligible residents in the near future.

Andrew West / The News-Press / USA Today Network via Reuters

There are 24 million healthcare workers and residents of long-term care facilities, which are part of the first priority group. Americans over the age of 74 and essential front-line workers, who make up about 49 million people, make up the second group, followed by 129 million Americans over the age of 64 or with poor health. underlying.

Given Azar’s Tuesday announcement that the three groups should be pushed back to the top of the vaccination line, more than 200 million Americans have now claimed a vaccine.

According to Moncef Slaoui, chief advisor of Operation Warp Speed, only half of that number will be vaccinated by March.

MANDEL NGAN / AFP via Getty Images

The speed of US deployment is already well below Slaoui’s forecasts.

He predicted last month that 50 million Americans would be vaccinated by the end of January. With just 17 days to go to that deadline, only 11.1 million doses have been administered and only 30 million doses have been dispensed, according to the CDC.