KY to start vaccinating those in 1C on Monday. In Fayette County that’s 80,000 people
Gov. Andy Beshear said earlier this week that he expects the state’s regional COVID-19 vaccination centers to start Monday vaccinating the next group of eligible people or those in 1C — those with serious medical conditions, those over the age of 60 and essential workers.
“We also expect local health departments and others to begin vaccinating 1C,” Beshear said at a press conference.
In Fayette County, the number of people who fall into that category is roughly one-third of the total population. Lexington city leaders said Thursday during Mayor Linda Gorton’s coronavirus update.
“It’s a little more than 80,000 people,” said Chuck Mix, who has been hired to help the city implement vaccinations. In 2019, Fayette County’s population was estimated at 323,152.
Mix said not everyone in 1B, including first responders, teachers, child care workers, and those over 70, has been vaccinated yet.
The city’s main vaccination sites — including University of Kentucky’s Kroger Field, the regional site at the Kentucky Horse Park and some Walgreen pharmacies — are still vaccinating those over 70 Mix said.
“There are segments of the state and segments of our own county that are still heavy into 1b,” Mix said Thursday. “There is a good percentage of our 70-plus population that have not received it.”
Still, there is some good news. The number of vaccine doses allocated will likely ramp up soon.
Mix said Pfizer recently announced it had cut its production time in half, dramatically increasing the number of doses available across the country. Johnson & Johnson is seeking approval of its vaccine this week.
“We are now at around 15,000 doses a week,” Mix said of Fayette County’s allotment. That’s up substantially from the 1,500 to 2,000 doses it first received in early December when it started administering the vaccine.
“We expect the allocation of vaccine to increase,” Mix said.
In fact, in preparation for a bump in the number of vaccines, the city is looking at starting another vaccination site in the coming weeks or months, Mix said.
Most of the vaccination sites are staffed largely by volunteers. Gorton said almost all the sites are in desperate need of more volunteers. To find out more, go to https://lexingtonmrc.wordpress.com.
As of Feb. 20, more than 48,000 Fayette County residents have received at least one dose, said Kevin Hall, a Fayette County Health Department spokesman. That number does not include people who have received the vaccine through the U.S. Veterans Administration or other federal allotments. Seventy-seven percent of people vaccinated are white, 6 percent are Black, and only 2.3 percent are Hispanic.
Gorton said the city’s partnership with UK to get mobile vaccination clinics into predominately minority neighborhoods has helped up the number of minorities who are getting that vaccine. A clinic last weekend vaccinated more than 500 people, Gorton said.
To boot, the city’s education and outreach campaign — Lex Do This! — is also working to target minority populations who may be reluctant to get the vaccine and traditionally have been medically underserved.
Kip Cornett, who helps the city coordinate that campaign, said they have targeted messaging for the city’s Spanish-speaking population. It is working with UK, the city-run Global Lex and Kentucky Refugee Ministries to translate vaccination information into different languages and get the word out.
Based on Fayette County Public School data, some estimate that as much as 25 percent of Fayette County’s population is foreign-born.
Cornett said Thursday they are working hard to target those non-English speaking populations, but it will take time.
“We are also trying to find out who are the influencers in those communities,” Cornett said.
