Hundreds of residents and staff of Minnesota nursing homes began to get vaccinated Monday for the novel coronavirus — a critical turning point in the state's battle to protect people who are particularly vulnerable to the deadly disease.
Early Monday, teams of pharmacy workers with CVS Health and Walgreens fanned out to dozens of nursing homes across the state, which have been especially hard hit by the virus, and began administering initial shots of the Moderna vaccine. The plan is to vaccinate everyone who lives or works at Minnesota's 2,100 long-term care facilities, including assisted-living homes, by the end of January, dependent on vaccine supply, state officials said.
Elderly residents and employees of senior care facilities have been given priority for the vaccines because they have been shown to be especially at risk of being exposed to the virus. Large nursing homes, in particular, have been the sites of fast-moving outbreaks that have sickened or killed hundreds of seniors and forced many facilities to impose strict lockdowns that kept residents from seeing loved ones for months at a time, exacerbating health problems. So far, 65% of the 5,160 deaths from COVID-19 in Minnesota have occurred in long-term care communities, state records show.
The vaccines are arriving at a precarious time for senior care providers still reeling from a frightening resurgence of COVID-19 infections during the fall. A rash of new outbreaks since September has strained facilities that were already short of staff and has forced a growing number of facilities to reach out to the state for emergency assistance, in a rerun of the pandemic's harrowing early months. Infections have abated in recent weeks, but the virus is still raging in these communities: Some 87% of Minnesota's nursing homes and 55% of assisted-living facilities still had active outbreaks of the virus as of Dec. 21, according to state Department of Health data.
"This is a really big deal. It gives us hope and literally will save lives," said Patti Cullen, president and chief executive of Care Providers of Minnesota, a long-term care industry group. "I am also telling folks to be patient — they need two doses of vaccines plus two weeks after for full impact, and we will not be reopening to full visitation until the vaccine is more widely distributed."
State health officials said that all 369 skilled-nursing facilities are expected to administer vaccines to staff and residents over the next few weeks. The agency said that the state's 1,700 assisted-living facilities, which house more than twice as many people as nursing homes, are expected to begin vaccinations in mid- to late January.
The large pharmacy chains spent months planning the vaccination rollout and are doing it in phases. The initial focus is on skilled-nursing homes because they house sicker and more vulnerable patients. The effort's logistics differ by facility, but residents are typically brought out of their rooms and receive the shots in communal areas while staying socially distanced from others. Elderly residents who are too frail or sick to move have been receiving the injections in their rooms.
A spokeswoman at CVS Health said the company's pharmacists planned to vaccinate residents and workers at nearly 600 nursing homes and assisted-living facilities over the next three months. Both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines require two doses, spread three to four weeks apart, which is why the process will take so long. All told, the vaccinations by CVS will reach 63,000 residents and staff across Minnesota.
