LOS ANGELES (CBSLA) Teachers and food and agricultural workers are among Los Angeles County’s estimated 1.2 million residents who are now eligible for the COVID-19 vaccine as of Monday.
Vehicles will make their way across parking lots at Dodger Stadium for COVID-19 vaccinations on Feb. 25, 2021 (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times / Getty Images).
Also newcomers who are eligible to be vaccinated are childcare workers, law enforcement officers and social workers. They will join health professionals and people over 65, who have been receiving the vaccine for several weeks now.
However, health officials said those workers will need to be patient as vaccine supplies remain limited and staff are trained to ensure that only eligible people receive injections.
“Therefore it will take a long time to vaccinate these groups unless the vaccine supply increases significantly,” says Dr. Paul Simon, LA County Department of Public Health’s Chief Science Officer. “We encourage the patience of the public as we go through this process as quickly as possible.”
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About 700,000 LA County residents over 65 have yet to receive their first dose.
The City of LA expects to receive approximately 70,000 doses of Moderna vaccine Monday, which will serve primarily for second doses at the six mass vaccination centers – San Fernando Park, Hansen Dam, Crenshaw Christian Center, Lincoln Park, Pierce College, and Dodger Stadium – when released Tuesday reopen after they closed on Sundays and Mondays.
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“Our vaccination program has faced many challenges, but we have made it clear that nothing will disrupt our mission to deliver this life-saving vaccine to Angelenos as quickly and safely as possible,” Mayor Garcetti said in a statement Sunday. “By qualifying more groups of essential workers, more lives will be saved and our recovery will be accelerated. We are encouraged to listen to pledges for more vaccines from our federal and state partners and are ready to scale up our operations to end this pandemic. “
All second doses for this week are automatically scheduled for patients who received their first dose in a city between February 1 and February 6. Patients will receive a notification on Sunday evening with the details of the appointment.
The city’s mobile sites will also triple their total capacity this week, increasing doses delivered to vulnerable communities from 4,000 to 12,000, officials said.
Garcetti’s office also said the city has begun the planning process to include the recently FDA-approved Johnson & Johnson vaccine in its inventory in the coming weeks. Government Newsom said on Saturday that California could receive up to 380,000 doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine this week.
Friday, Simon said the LA County-operated sites are expecting a total of 269,000 doses this week, up from 211,000 last week. With the county now reserving a majority of those doses for second doses, a total of 103,000 first doses will be available this week for the three sectors of workers and people 65 and older.
Government Gavin Newsom has mandated that 10% of all vaccine supplies received in the state be immediately reserved for teachers, child carers and other school personnel. But it will be a weekly challenge to distribute the education allocation among the 80 school districts in Los Angeles County.
To address this problem, the province has come up with a complex formula to distribute the vaccine fairly. Of the doses assigned to the education sector on a weekly basis, 9% will automatically go to private schools in the county, reflecting the percentage of county students they serve.
The province’s 80 individual school districts – excluding those in Long Beach and Pasadena, which have their own health departments – will be divided into five groups. The remaining available doses are divided among those groups based on a formula that evaluates the factors of the overall enrollment of students; the percentage of students living in poverty – based on those who qualify for free or discounted lunches; COVID case rates in each community; and whether schools have already provided personal services to students with a higher need.
The formula means that the LAUSD – the country’s second largest school district – is likely to receive about 40% of the doses available in the education sector each week.
As of March 15, the state has approved shots for anyone 16 and older with an underlying health condition that puts them at higher risk of serious illness or death from COVID. Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said last week that it is still unclear whether the province will actually qualify for that group on March 15 due to delivery issues.
Here is the full list of Level 1B groups now eligible for the vaccine. Click here for more information or to check your eligibility:
(1) Persons aged 65 and over
(2) Education and childcare
• Public schools (K-12)
• Independent schools
• Charter schools
• Childcare and early childhood education
• Contracted educational support staff
• Junior Colleges
• Colleges and universities
(3) Emergency services
• Police / law enforcement officers
• National security
• Correction and workers
• Courts / legal counsel and prosecution
• Campus and school police
• Rehabilitation and re-entry
• Federal law enforcement agencies
• Police, fire and ambulance providers
• Security personnel to maintain building access control and physical security measures
• DCFS, APS (workers who physically respond to abuse and neglect of children, the elderly and dependent adults)
(4) Food and agriculture
• Food personnel
• Employees in food production
• Supermarket employees
• Livestock workers, including those involved in veterinary health
• Farmers
• Veterinarians
• Food and agriculture related port and transport workers
(© Copyright 2021 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All rights reserved. City News Service contributed to this report.)