New Details, Timeline For COVID-19 Vaccine Shots For Kids, 65+

Danbury CT

23 September, 2021

7:30 PM

Description

CONNECTICUT — Residents aged 65 and over who have received their second dose of the Pfizer vaccine at least six months ago are now eligible to receive a booster shot in Connecticut. The recommendation, from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, was issued Thursday afternoon even as Gov. Ned Lamont and senior state health officials were giving a news conference on the spread of COVID-19 in Connecticut. Also eligible for boosters will be those who live in long-term care facilities and adults 50 to 64 with underlying medical conditions. This time, there's plenty of vaccine to go around. "We've been prepared for this, we've been expecting this, and our providers have as well," said Connecticut Chief Operating Officer Josh Geballe. There are more than 800 vaccination sites in place, and all are poised to start doling out boosters. Geballe said he expects that everyone who is eligible could receive their third jab within the next week. About 24,000 Connecticut residents have already jumped the line, due to their immunocompromised status. Next on the vaccination list will be children aged 5-11, currently ineligible while federal health agencies continue their testing on that age cohort. Lamont predicted Thursday that the Food & Drug Administration would issue an emergency use authorization for the Pfizer vaccine that would see the grade schoolers lining up for their vaccinations as early as the end of October. Once that happens, the governor said he would "take a second look at our protocols." All students, teachers, and school staff are currently required to wear masks while inside school buildings — an executive order that has proven highly controversial and contentious. That order is set to sunset on Sept. 30 unless legislators grant Lamont an extension to the emergency powers issued to him in response to the COVID-19 pandemic back in March 2020. Lamont said that a vaccine mandate for school children, such as in currently in place for state workers, would be unlikely so long as the authorization for the vaccine was for emergency use only. The State Health Commissioner is "Cautiously Optimistic" The number of Connecticut residents hospitalized with the virus climbed higher overnight by 13 beds, to 282, but Dr. Manisha Juthani, the state's newly appointed commissioner of Public Health, said she remained upbeat about the state's COVID-19 prognosis going into winter. Juthani cautioned that DPH had no way to distinguish among the patients who were admitted to a hospital complaining of COVID-19, and those who were taken in for an unrelated illness and just happened to test positive while they were there. DPH recorded another 36 coronavirus-related deaths in the past week, bringing the state death toll to 8,483. Coronavirus infection levels are beginning to "plateau," Juthani said, and she predicted that, so long as residents continued their vaccination efforts, a winter coronavirus surge would be prevented. Even more encouraging: "We are not seeing a threat from a (new) variant at this point," Juthani said, although she expected residents would continue to "hear about" new variants so long as COVID-19 was circulating. "Things are looking very promising at this point, and as we get children eligible for vaccines as well, there's a possibility we will be looking better and better," Juthani said. "It is the winter months when respiratory viruses circulate in general, and we have to be ... prepared for the worst, but I am cautiously optimistic." The daily coronavirus positivity rate rose 0.14 percent overnight, t0 2.28 percent, according to the latest DPH data. That's on the basis of 591 new cases of COVID-19 reported on Thursday, after 25,897 tests. See Also: Should COVID-19 Vaccinations Be Mandatory? Take Patch's Survey LISTEN: 911 Calls On Assisted Living Staff Overdosing On FentanylTroconis Seeks To Suppress Statements In Jennifer Dulos Case