Here’s how the next wave of vaccine rollout will work in DeKalb County

The COVID-19 pandemic locally took a significant turn Tuesday as the first of the COVID-19 vaccine was administered to healthcare workers on the frontlines. Further rollout of the vaccine, however, will take time.

Here’s how the DeKalb County Health Department, in accordance with federal regulations, plans to continue distribution and administration of the vaccine to priority groups, including those most at-risk and essential workers, in the months ahead. Rollout will be a phased approach, with priority groups getting the vaccine based on a tiered system laid out by the federal government.

Above all, Lisa Gonzalez, public health administrator for the DeKalb County Health Department, is asking the community for patience, she said Tuesday.

“We are very excited to move into this next phase of pandemic response,” Gonzalez said. “The primary goal of Phase 1A is to vaccine our frontline healthcare workers. This week is a great start but there is still a lot of work to do. We anticipate that this phase will take several weeks to complete, and we ask the public for patience at this time.”

Currently, there is no vaccine registration system countywide for members of the public to register to receive their dose, Gonzalez said, but the best way to keep up to date with when that will occur is keep an eye on the DeKalb County Health Department’s public channels. Individuals can stay tuned to local media and to the health department’s website, along with signing up for a health department newsletter to keep apprised of the situation.

Of the 800 doses of Moderna vaccine given to DeKalb County healthcare workers Tuesday, 700 were received from another local health department and 100 came directly from the Illinois Department of Public Health, according to a Tuesday update from the county’s vaccine plan website.

All of those doses went to healthcare workers at Northwestern Medicine hospitals: 700 to Kishwaukee and 100 to Valley West.

This initial dose distribution is designated as Phase 1, which also includes residents living in long-term care facilities. CVS and Walgreens are partnering to oversee distribution of the vaccine to those residents, through a federal program called the Pharmacy Partnership Program.

The DeKalb County Health Department has been told that the expected start date for that long-term care distribution locally may begin as early as this week, according to a Tuesday post on its website.

Additional vaccine is expected to arrive on a weekly basis to the county, and will be part of a distribution plan designated Phase 1A, which after healthcare and long-term care residents and staff will include in this order: EMS workers, local health department staff, clinic facility staff, home-healthcare professionals, pharmacy staff, and other medical workers such as dental and optical workers, along with other healthcare workers, according to IDPH guidelines updated Dec. 28.

Distribution of all Phase 1A priority groups is expected to take weeks, even months, according to the county health department website. Northwestern Medicine Kish and Valley West President Jay Anderson said Tuesday he expects all health system personnel who wish to get a vaccine to be immunized by February.

Once that is complete, Phase 1B will begin, which will prioritize essential workers, people with certain underlying medical conditions, and older adults 65 and up who are at higher risk for developing more severe complications due to COVID-19 or at a greater risk of dying from the virus.

Phase 2 could include workers in industries “essential to the functioning of society” according to IDPH and those with comorbid conditions, and Phase 3 could other adults not yet specified by the state health department.

Timeline for local rollout of those groups has not yet been identified.

The health department is working with the IDPH to implement a statewide vaccine scheduling and registration tool.

According to the IDPH, vaccine supply is expected to significantly increase in 2021, and therefore local allotments per county. Counties with higher death rates and case counts relative to population are prioritized over those with lesser.