Judge-Executive Al Mattingly on Wednesday spoke with state officials about the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines across Kentucky — discussing the overall supply shortage, how to identify underserved populations, hopefulness about the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, and the potential for more vaccination sites in Daviess County.
“Pfizer released their vaccine 11 weeks ago. Moderna released their vaccine to the public 10 weeks ago,” said Jim Gray, Director of the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet. “In that time, in Kentucky alone, almost 17% of our eligible population over 60 has been vaccinated. We will cross 600,000 vaccinations this week. The challenge so far has been three words: supply, supply, supply.”
Though vaccines have already been distributed to 350 sites statewide, Contact Tracing Project Manager Mark Carter said he’s also begun activating federally qualified health centers in Kentucky as well.
“We’ll be activating more of those over the coming weeks as we get more vaccine,” Carter said.
Mattingly asked whether there was anything the state government could do to focus on vaccinating the underserved and vulnerable populations across the Commonwealth, saying Daviess County officials have identified a number of those areas locally.
“We’ve identified three or four at-risk census tracts, where the majority of the folks are elderly and would not have computers or cell phones,” Mattingly said. “And a lot of our minority populations are living in these tracts. We’re trying to address these needs.”
Gray said the social vulnerability index gave the state some ideas on how to target those groups, but he said more vaccines would be needed before any programs could be fully executed.
“The more supply we get, the more robust our distribution becomes,” he said.
Gray said Johnson & Johnson was expected to deliver 20 million doses of its single-dose vaccine in the next few weeks, meaning Daviess County could receive up to 26,000 more doses once distribution begins.
Carter also said the state was working with bigger stores such as Walmart to become vaccination sites, along with independent pharmacies. He said at least one independent pharmacy in Daviess County would likely be activated as a vaccination site in the near future.
Until then, however, the state was focusing on continuing the progress made through Owensboro Health Regional Hospital and the Green River District Health Department.
“The hospital has done such a good job and the health department has done such a good job that we’re encouraging them to increase their footprint on the number of vaccinations they’re giving,” Gray said.
