A10
OREGON
East Oregonian
Saturday, March 13, 2021
Brown applauds Biden’s vaccine timeline
Oregon governor
warns in order to meet
goal, more vaccine
needed
By GARY A. WARNER
Oregon Capital Bureau
SALEM — Oregon would need
up to double the doses of COVID-
19 vaccine it currently receives to
fulfill President Joe Biden’s seven-
week sprint to allow all adults to be
offered inoculation, Oregon health
officials said on Friday, March 12.
Gov. Kate Brown and top state
medical experts held a press call on
March 12 to say they hoped to meet
Biden’s timeline, but would move
cautiously.
Brown said she welcomed
Biden’s “audacious announce-
ment.”
“I will do everything I can to
make it happen,” she said.
Oregon’s current staggered
priority groups wouldn’t match
Biden’s deadline until July 1.
States have the central author-
ity over public health and Brown
said the present plan would stay in
place until there was a guaranteed
supply before she would unleash
additional demand onto the already
strained system.
Oregon officials were only
recently told they would receive
200,000 doses per month, up from
the previous 120,000 doses.
Asked how much more vaccine
Oregon would need to meet Biden’s
schedule, Allen said it would
“require a doubling of those doses.”
“It would need to be an increase
on that kind of order of magnitude,”
Allen said. “Maybe 300,000.”
Part of the math problem has to
do with the vaccines themselves.
Until recently, Oregon was only
receiving the Pfizer and Modern
vaccines, each of which requires
two shots given about a month
apart.
The state has received the initial
shipments of a new vaccine from
Johnson & Johnson that requires a
single shot.
Brown and Allen both said their
caution came from not wanting to
set off the kind of policy whiplash
that hit Oregonians in mid-January.
When the Trump Adminis-
tration announced the immedi-
ate release of a large stockpile of
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian, FIle
Doris Pitzer, 90, receives her first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine from Jessica Marcum during a vaccination clinic
at Good Shepherd Hospital in Hermiston on Feb. 12, 2021.
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian, File
Registered nurse Kori Hibbard prepares to administer a dose of the Mod-
erna COVID-19 vaccine to Kari Ferguson, a secretary at Gib Olinger Ele-
mentary School in Milton-Freewater, during a vaccination clinic at the
Pendleton Convention Center on Jan. 28, 2021.
additional doses, Brown dropped
her carefully crafted priority tier
policy. She announced everyone in
Oregon age 65 and over would be
eligible for shots.
Trump officials said within 48
hours that there was no stockpile
of new doses.
“This is a deception on a
national scale,” Brown said at the
time.
The governor had to reverse
G O O D S H E P H E R D H E A LT H C A R E S Y S T E M
Let’s Get Your Sleep
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herself and put eligibility restric-
tions back in place.
Biden said on Thursday, March
11, that he wanted the nation far
enough along in its vaccination
program to allow for small Fourth
of July celebrations.
“If we all do our part, this coun-
try will be vaccinated soon, our
economy will be on the mend, our
kids will be back in school, and
we’ll have proven once again that
this country can do anything,” he
said.
Though Oregon officials have
a much higher level of confidence
in Biden’s streamlined transport
system and increased manufactur-
ing of vaccine, Allen said supply
needed to be on the way first.
“We know the previous admin-
istration made previous announce-
ments it was unable to fill,” Allen
said.
Oregon is currently limiting
shots to health workers, residents of
nursing homes, educators and day
care workers, and most recently,
all residents age 65 and older as of
March 1.
The next eligible group can
seek shots on March 29. It’s a
long list that includes adults age
45 and older with specific medi-
cal issues, agricultural and other
food processing workers, home-
less people, residents of low-in-
come housing, those displaced by
last year’s wildfires and wildland
firefighters.
Pregnant women age 16 and
over were recently added to the
group.
OHA has not been able to give
estimates on how many people will
become eligible on March 29.
May 1 — the date that Biden
wants eligibility to be offered to all
adults nationwide — is currently
listed as adding front-line work-
ers (those who deal daily with the
public), those living in multigener-
ational households, and those age
16-44 with certain medical condi-
tions.
Brown’s plan calls for everyone
age 45 and older to be eligible on
June 1. On July 1, all adults would
be able to seek shots.
Dr. Dean Sidelinger, the state’s
top infectious expert, said offi-
cials were looking at studies
from around the country about
school reopenings. Some indicate
Oregon’s mandate for students to
be spaced 6 feet apart when they
return to the classroom could be
cut to 3 feet. No policy change is
currently in the pipeline, despite
requests to Brown from school
districts.
Allen said the vaccination effort
involving seniors was going well
statewide, though he noted some
counties — such as Deschutes —
were ahead of the goal to have 75%
percent of eligible seniors inocu-
lated, while other counties lagged
behind.
Brown praised the support of
Oregon’s congressional delegation
for Biden’s $1.9 trillion stimulus
legislation, which includes $1,400
direct payments to Americans, aid
for COVID-19 distribution, unem-
ployment aid, and funds to buttress
state and local budgets strained by
the pandemic.
Rep. Cliff Bentz, R-Ontario,
joined all House Republicans in
opposing the bill, saying it was too
expensive and included too much
non-pandemic related spending.
The rest of Oregon’s congressio-
nal delegation — all Democrats —
supported the bill.
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