VACCINE AVAILABILITY
Over 16,000 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in Washington County, but we still have a long way to go. Washington County continues to receive weekly vaccination allocations, but the current supply is not nearly enough to meet the demand. Please note that adults aged 65 and up continue to be the priority for receiving vaccination appointment slots as they become available. Currently, the waitlist for this group in Washington County is approximately 21,000 people.
Meritus Health has enough second doses in supply to finish administering them to individuals who have received their first shot, but they are not proceeding with scheduling additional first shot appointments beyond this week until additional supply of the second shots has been received.
The Washington County Health Department has the following updates on Nursing homes, assisted living, independent living, and congregate living facilities:
Through federal contracts, CVS and Walgreens have completed vaccination clinics at nursing homes across the state and have begun scheduling vaccination clinics for assisted living and congregate living facilities.
In an effort to assist in vaccinating these vulnerable populations quickly, the Washington County Health Department has been working with the Maryland Department of Health to provide vaccination clinics to certain congregate living facilities in Washington County, MD.
On January 25, 2021, the Washington County Health Department began holding vaccination clinics for local congregate living facilities. As of today February 3, 2021, the Health Department has held clinics for the following facilities:
- The Arc of Washington County
- Human Development Council
- United Community Connections
- Way Station Inc.
- CW Brooks
Over the next several weeks the Health Department will be at the following facilities:
- Potomac Towers
- Walnut Towers
- Star Community
- Living Sands
If you are a current resident or staff at a congregate facility, please reach out to your facility’s management for more information on vaccination clinics and how to schedule your appointment. As we receive our weekly allocations of the vaccine, the health department is working to schedule more congregate living facilities in the coming weeks.
The Washington County Health Department is also working with the Washington County Commission on Aging under the direction of the Maryland Department of Health to identify independent living facilities in Washington County and will be working to schedule vaccination clinics at these facilities.
Educators
Under the direction of the Maryland Department of Health, local health departments must reserve 100 doses of their weekly vaccine allocations to vaccinate private and public school educators and daycare providers. Meritus Health is currently using a portion of its vaccine allocation to vaccinate public school staff. The health department has been reaching out to private schools to begin scheduling their staff for appointments starting next week. The health department can only schedule 100 appointments per week for this priority group as we are also required to prioritize our seniors and those living in congregate living facilities. It will take several weeks to schedule all private school and childcare staff. If your facility has not been contacted yet, we ask that you please be patient as vaccine availability is still very limited. In the meantime, management should gather a list of employees who are interested in receiving the vaccine, so that when they are contacted by the health department we will have an accurate count of those needing appointments and help us streamline our processes.
