COVID-19 infections fell again on Monday with 4,699 new cases, the lowest since late October, as health departments and hospitals prepare for 174,000 doses of Moderna Inc.’s recently approved vaccine. that arrives Wednesday and Thursday.
So far, 63,000 health workers in Illinois outside of Chicago have received their first doses of the dual vaccine. Chicago keeps a separate count.
And 60,450 additional doses of the Pfizer vaccine should be delivered Tuesday and Wednesday, government JB Pritzker’s office announced.
The Illinois Department of Public Health also reported 98 more deaths from the respiratory disease.
Typically, the number of new cases on Mondays is lower due to delayed reporting over the weekend.
According to federal protocols, all vaccinations this week are for health professionals, but officials at CFS and Walgreens are coordinating the logistics of giving injections to people in long-term care facilities starting Dec. 28.
“We will reach nearly 900 skilled nursing and assisted living facilities across Illinois, with the potential for 150,000 Illinois patients to access the vaccine,” said CFS spokesperson Charlie Rice-Minoso. “We will facilitate approximately 2,700 on-site clinics over the next 12 weeks.”
CFS is in the process of being vaccinated in nursing homes in other states this week, and the vaccines are well received, he said.
Hospitals in Illinois treated 4,460 patients with the virus as of Sunday evening. That’s lower than the 7-day average of 4667 and less than hospital admissions in the 5,000 and 6,000 in November – but it’s still a worrying level, experts said.
Last week, the IDPH and Chicago separately received about 109,000 doses of vaccines.
“Later this week, the DuPage County Health Department is expected to receive the first shipment of the Moderna vaccine,” said spokeswoman Stephanie Cavillo. “We will continue to work with local health systems to coordinate the timely delivery of their vaccine allocations.”
The Moderna boost is welcome news after Pritzker announced on Wednesday that the state would only get 50% of Pfizer’s assigned vaccines this week.
Loyola University Medical Center operates three vaccination clinics and as of Monday had used up about half of the allocated amount, said Regional Chief Clinical Officer Richard Freeman.
“We don’t want to lose momentum,” he said. After vaccinating medical personnel, the hospital wants to start vaccinating patients with underlying medical conditions such as cancer, Freeman said.
Initially, some vaccines were first delivered to a state warehouse in Peoria, but now the doses go straight to hospitals, Pritzker spokeswoman Jordan Abudayyeh said.
Despite the state operating under strict COVID-19 restrictions with closed cinemas, banquet halls and no indoor dining, there are tons of indoor and outdoor shopping malls on Sundays grabbing presents.
That poses a risk to contracting the virus, said pediatrician Michael Bauer, medical director of Northwestern Medicine and Lake Forest Hospital.
But if you take that risk, then mask yourself, be smart about social distance, and “don’t queue,” Bauer advised.
“When they are in a store they only allow 10 people, but outside there are 50 people in line, and it’s like a typical line that is not remote. I wouldn’t be in that kind of line to wait, ”he said.
The percentage of positivity for COVID-19 cases is 7.5% based on a seven-day average.
The number of COVID-19 cases in Illinois since the start of the pandemic stands at 905,069 with 15,299 deaths.
Labs has processed 86,454 tests in the last 24 hours.