{"id":5673,"date":"2020-12-10T15:22:14","date_gmt":"2020-12-10T20:22:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.indianz.com\/News\/?p=5673"},"modified":"2020-12-10T15:25:13","modified_gmt":"2020-12-10T20:25:13","slug":"montana-free-press-confederated-salish-and-kootenai-tribes-prepared-for-coronavirus-vaccine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/2020\/12\/10\/montana-free-press-confederated-salish-and-kootenai-tribes-prepared-for-coronavirus-vaccine\/","title":{"rendered":"Montana Free Press: Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes prepare for coronavirus vaccine"},"content":{"rendered":"\"cskt\"\r\n
The Joe McDonald Health & Activity Center on the Flathead Reservation in Montana, home to the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes. Photo: U.S. Department of Education<\/a>\r\n<\/figcaption>\r\n
Montana prepares for initial COVID-19 vaccinations<\/div>\r\n
The first doses could arrive as early as next Tuesday, and will be prioritized for health care workers and assisted living facilities.<\/div>\r\n
Thursday, December 10, 2020<\/div>\r\n
By Mara Silvers<\/div>\r\n
Montana Free Press<\/DIV>\r\n
montanafreepress.org<\/A><\/DIV>\r\n

<\/P>\r\n\r\nWhen 9,750 doses of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine arrive in Montana as early as next Tuesday, the delivery will mark the beginning of a complex distribution plan organized by public health officials, hospital administrations and commercial pharmacies.\u00a0

<\/P>\r\n\r\n\r\nThe goal of the initial round of distribution, state officials say, is to get the vaccine to as many frontline health care workers as possible. As of Tuesday, Montana reported 17,293 active cases, with approximately 70% of the state\u2019s ICU beds full, and 38% of those occupied by COVID-19 patients. \r\nScores of health care workers have had to stay home sick or quarantine<\/a>\r\nbecause of exposure to COVID-positive patients.\u00a0\r\n

<\/P>\r\n\r\nAfter the Pfizer vaccine is cleared for emergency use by the Food and Drug Administration, which plans to discuss the proposal on Thursday, hospitals will begin to administer the first batch of vaccines to a fraction of the state\u2019s health care workforce, particularly in more populated cities and towns.\u00a0

<\/P>\r\n\r\nOfficials with the state Department of Public Health and Human Services say the coming vaccines are a crucial tool in fighting the disease.

<\/P>\r\n\r\n\u201cThe vaccine is a really good opportunity to help us get through this pandemic and reduce the burden of the virus on our communities,\u201d said Bekki Wehner, who heads the department\u2019s Communicable Disease Control and Emergency Preparedness Bureau. \u201cThe hard part is that there are going to be times when there are limited supplies of vaccine. We just need to work our way through it and take it day by day.\u201d

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On Nov 20, we submitted a request to @US_FDA for Emergency Use Authorization of our investigational #COVID19 vaccine with @BioNTech_Group. What is an EUA? \ud83d\udcad Commissioner @SteveFDA shares more.<\/p>\n\t\t<\/a>\n\t<\/div>\n\t

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<\/p>\r\nDuring the state\u2019s preliminary stages of distribution, officially designated as Phase 1a, health care workers and adult care facility residents and staff are considered top priority. Later phases will include more groups that the \r\nAssociation for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology<\/a>\r\n(APIC), a nonprofit professional organization, \r\nhas recommended be moved to the front of the line<\/a>, including designated essential workers such as firefighters and education employees. The state has said it will rely on those recommendations to guide its distribution plan.\u00a0\r\n

<\/P>\r\n\r\n\r\nIn the short term, the distribution of the small number of early doses from Pfizer is full of hurdles for health care officials to navigate. The state is including only a handful of well-resourced hospitals in the early round of vaccine administration because those hospitals already have access to the necessary storage facilities: \r\nultracold freezers that can keep the Pfizer vaccine<\/a>\r\nat its required temperature.\u00a0\r\n

<\/P>\r\n\r\nThe Montana facilities that have been cleared to receive the doses from the state are Billings Clinic and St. Vincent Healthcare in Billings, Bozeman Health Deaconess Hospital, St. James Hospital in Butte, Benefis Health System and Great Falls Clinic, St. Peter\u2019s Health in Helena, Kalispell Regional Medical Center, and Providence St. Patrick Hospital and Community Medical Center in Missoula.

<\/P>\r\n\r\nLarger hospitals are considered appropriate recipients of the first distribution batch because they have more employees. Pfizer\u2019s vaccine shipments contain a minimum of 975 doses. Hospitals and health care providers that employ a significantly smaller number of frontline health care workers, Wehner said, weren\u2019t considered a good fit for the initial distribution.

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Montana coronavirus report https:\/\/t.co\/SPRVolhBIF #mtnews<\/p>\n\t\t<\/a>\n\t<\/div>\n\t

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<\/p>\r\nIn the coming weeks, Wehner said, a COVID-19 vaccine manufactured by Moderna, which is also awaiting emergency use authorization from the FDA, may be a better fit for health care facilities in rural and remote communities. That vaccine is expected to ship in smaller packs of 100 doses, and does not require the same access to cold storage.\u00a0

<\/P>\r\n\r\n\r\n\u201cIn those [rural] communities, the Moderna vaccine makes more sense,\u201d Wehner said. As the state progresses through subsequent phases of distribution, she continued, the department might also look to orchestrate a \u201c\r\nhub and spoke model<\/a>\u201d by which the vaccine could be ferried to remote communities from centralized locations.\u00a0\r\n

<\/P>\r\n\r\n\r\nOther players involved with securing vaccine shipments and overseeing distribution include \r\nCVS and Walgreens<\/a>, which have federal contracts to supply vaccinations to long-term care facilities, and the federal \r\nIndian Health Service<\/a>, which several tribal nations in Montana have opted to work with.\u00a0\r\n

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FURTHER CHALLENGES<\/div>\r\nOnce the vaccines become more widely available to people outside the health care professions and adult care facilities, communities across the state will be working to minimize a range of other barriers to access.

<\/P>\r\n\r\nIn a state with a population density of roughly one person per square mile, ensuring that residents can easily receive the vaccine is no simple task, said Sophia Newcomer, an assistant professor of epidemiology at the University of Montana.

<\/P>\r\n\r\n\u201cIf people have to drive far, if they have to take time off work, if there\u2019s transportation challenges, those are certainly barriers to vaccine access,\u201d Newcomer said, adding that now is the time for health officials and community members to think holistically about how to facilitate distribution.\u00a0

<\/P>\r\n\r\n\u201cThere are some strategies that we\u2019ve looked at in the past, such as mobile vaccination clinics, that may not work as well with some of these initial vaccines that do have very specific temperature requirements,\u201d she said. \u201cBut I think now is the time to be creative and make sure that when specific locations have these vaccines, that we can make it as easy as possible for people to present and get those vaccines.\u201d

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