HANCOCK COUNTY — Hundreds of COVID-19 vaccine appointments in the county had to be rescheduled after harsh winter weather closed clinics earlier this week.
Hancock Regional Hospital and the Hancock County Health Department closed their COVID-19 vaccine clinics Tuesday, Feb. 16 as snow covered much of the nation.
Tim Livesay, director of pharmacy for the hospital, said about 360 appointments had to be rescheduled at the hospital’s clinic. The hospital uses the state’s COVID-19 vaccine scheduling system, which sent those with appointments a text message on how to reschedule.
“But we took it upon ourselves to make as many phone calls and reschedule as many of them as we could,” Livesay said.
Those who had to miss their second dose of a vaccine have some latitude. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advises second doses should be administered as close to the recommended interval as possible. For Pfizer-BioNTech’s vaccine, that’s 21 days; for Moderna’s, it’s 28. The CDC also says if a delay is unavoidable, a second dose can come up to 42 days after the first. And even if it goes beyond that, there’s no need to restart the series, according to the guidance.
This week, the hospital’s clinic went from operating eight hours to 10 hours a day, allowing it to go from administering 288 doses a day to 360. Over the next two weeks, it will expand even more — to 12-hour days able to administer up to 432 doses a day. For those weeks, the clinic will also operate six days a week, one day more than it currently does.
While there have been reports of weather postponing COVID-19 shipments throughout the state and country this week, Livesay said the hospital is not experiencing any delivery delays.
The clinic had administered 11,105 COVID-19 vaccinations as of Wednesday evening, with just over 3,600 being second doses and almost 7,500 being first doses.
As of Friday morning, the hospital’s next available vaccine appointments were on Feb. 27.
Crystal Baker, office manager and preparedness coordinator for the Hancock County Health Department, told the Daily Reporter in an email that 130 appointments had to be rescheduled because of Tuesday’s weather. All of them have rescheduled by calling 2-1-1, accessing their appointment through the cancellation link that was sent to them, or through the health department calling them to reschedule.
“We are working to make sure individuals that were scheduled for their second dose are completed in the appropriate time frame,” Baker added.
She also said the health department’s clinic has not been affected by any shipping delays and that it is closing in on 3,000 total administered vaccinations.
As of Friday morning, the health department’s next available vaccine appointments were on March 23.
Other vaccine clinics in Hancock County are located in Kroger and Walmart, both in Greenfield, as well as Meijer in McCordsville.
Dr. Lindsay Weaver, chief medical officer for the Indiana State Department of Health, said more than 43,000 COVID-19 vaccine appointments statewide were affected by the weather this week after more than 80 clinics temporarily closed.
“To further complicate matters this week, we have experienced delays in vaccine shipments due to the bad weather,” Weaver said during a media briefing Wednesday.
She added the state had yet to receive its shipment of vaccine made by Moderna for the week, leading her to believe more appointments across the state would need to be rescheduled.
“We have worked with those clinics to reschedule their patients as quickly as possible,” Weaver said. “This includes adding new appointments and adding extra days to the clinic schedules to ensure that there are no unnecessary delays in getting vaccines in arms.”
Due to the delays, the state is keeping vaccine eligibility at health care workers, first responders and those age 65 and older, Weaver said.
“Once the vaccine deliveries get back on schedule, our plan is to open eligibility up to Hoosiers age 60 to 65,” she continued. “We will see how the weather continues to impact our shipments, but hopefully we will be able to expand as soon as sometime next week.”
More than 60% of the state’s eligible populations have scheduled a vaccine or already received at least their first dose, Weaver also said.
GETTING THE VACCINE
COVID-19 vaccinations in Indiana are available to health care workers, first responders and individuals age 65 and older. Appointments can be scheduled at ourshot.in.gov. Assistance signing up for a vaccination is also available by calling 2-1-1.
BY THE NUMBERS
COVID-19 data through early Friday, Feb. 19
Hancock County
- 316 new tests administered
- 10 new cases
- 5.3% seven-day (Feb. 6-12) positivity rate all tests, 10% cumulative rate
- 0 new deaths
- 88,849 total tests administered
- 40,651 total individuals tested
- 7,351 total cases
- 9.7% seven-day (Feb. 6-12) positivity rate unique individuals, 18.1% cumulative rate
- 128 total deaths
- 12,402 first doses of vaccine administered
- 5,774 fully vaccinated
Indiana
- 32,422 new tests administered (July 10, 2020-Feb. 18, 2021), 4,757 new individuals tested
- 1,080 new cases (Feb. 18)
- 4.4% seven-day (Feb. 6-12) positivity rate all tests, 10.1% cumulative rate
- 44 new deaths (Dec. 15, 2020-Feb. 18, 2021)
- 7,683,034 total tests administered
- 3,069,866 total individuals tested
- 653,245 total positive cases
- 11.3% seven-day (Feb. 6-12) positivity rate unique individuals, 21.3% cumulative rate
- 11,898 total deaths
- 427 total probable deaths
- 54.8% ICU beds in use – non-COVID
- 8.3% ICU beds in use – COVID
- 36.9% ICU beds available
- 16.3% ventilators in use – non-COVID
- 3.1% ventilators in use – COVID
- 80.6% ventilators available
- Hospital census: 948 total COVID-19 patients (673 confirmed, 275 under investigation)
- 866,680 first doses of vaccine administered
- 402,792 fully vaccinated
Source: Indiana State Department of Health
