Illinois is authorizing local health departments that have seen waning demand for coronavirus vaccinations to begin inoculating anyone 16 and older as higher positivity rates and other data show signs of a possible COVID-19 resurgence, the state Department of Public Health said Friday.
The state did not provide a list of counties that would fall in that category, instead encouraging residents to contact their local health departments. Officials in several collar counties said demand remained high and there were no plans to expand eligibility.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker last week announced the state would make all residents 16 and over eligible for a vaccination beginning April 12.
“But in those areas (where demand is not high), we didn’t want any doses sitting around,” Pritzker said Friday at an unrelated event in Chicago. “We want to make sure they get into people’s arms as fast as possible, especially if we’re going to see an uptick here in the numbers. We want to avoid a surge, so we’ve tried to jump on top of this as fast as possible.”
The flexibility for local health departments comes as hospital admissions and coronavirus positivity rates are beginning to climb once again, possibly derailing the state’s chances of advancing to the next phase of Pritzker’s revised reopening plan.
With more than 67% of residents 65 and older having received at least one vaccine dose as of Friday, the state is on pace in the coming days to reach the 70% threshold that must be reached before restrictions are loosened on a wide range of businesses.
But the state health department said it “is monitoring an increase in new hospital admissions for COVID, which will need to be appropriately addressed and resolved before moving” to the next phase.
Officials on Friday reported 3,002 new confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19, the highest
count since 3,062 cases were reported Feb. 6. The state has averaged 2,061 new daily cases over the past week, topping 2,000 for the first time since mid-February.
The seven-day statewide positivity rate for cases as a share of total tests was 2.9% as of Thursday, the highest level since the same rate was recorded for the week ending Feb. 14.
The seven-day average for new hospital admissions for COVID-19-like illness was 122 as of Tuesday, up from 92 on March 8.
“While these rates are certainly significantly lower than the peak, they represent a potential early warning sign about a possible resurgence,” the health department said in a statement.
The agency said recent trends in northern Illinois are particularly concerning, pointing to a 50% increase in daily cases in Chicago over the past week, rising cases and hospital bed usage in suburban Cook County, and increasing hospitalizations and positivity rates in the northern region that includes Rockford, DeKalb and Galena.
“This is very concerning, and it makes us take a pause here to evaluate these numbers,” Pritzker said of the recent trends.
Echoing comments from Chicago officials earlier in the week, the governor said it appears younger adults are driving the recent growth.
As part of its response, the state is sending rapid vaccination teams to five northwestern counties to administer the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine.
Health officials say the state expects to receive nearly 1 million additional vaccine doses next week, an all-time high.
As more doses become available, the state will continue giving each local health department its “baseline allocation of doses. New doses above that baseline will be allocated to high-demand areas where at-risk eligible residents face long waits for appointments,” the health department said.
The move could bring some relief to Chicago-area residents who’ve continued to have to scramble to find vaccine appointments, even as some downstate sites have had plentiful appointments.
Demand also continues to be high in the broader Chicago area.
“Our demand for vaccine is still very high and the supply remains limited,” Lake County Health Department executive director Mark Pfister said in a statement. “We will not be going full eligibility until April 12, 2021, as vaccine supply remains very limited.”
Health departments in Will and DuPage counties said much the same thing.
“We really want to hit that senior group hard between now and April 12,” Will County Health Department spokesman Steve Brandy said.
The state expanded eligibility at the beginning of this week to include government workers, higher-education employees and members of the media, and statewide eligibility will expand again Monday to include food and beverage workers, those in construction trades and religious leaders.
Chicago, which receives its own vaccine allocation and sets its own rules, is expanding Monday to include residents younger than 65 with certain preexisting health conditions and a larger group of frontline essential workers.
On Thursday, another 126,710 coronavirus vaccine doses were administered in Illinois, bringing the statewide total to 5,281,618, public health officials said.
The number of residents who have been fully vaccinated — receiving both of the required shots, or Johnson & Johnson’s single shot — reached 1,963,630, or 15.41% of the total population. About 34% of those 16 and older have received at least one dose.
The state averaged 99,449 vaccinations daily over the last seven days.
Health officials also reported 33 additional fatalities, accounting for a statewide death toll of 21,203. The total number of known infections in Illinois since the start of the pandemic reached 1,232,900.
The average number of daily deaths in Illinois also is rising again after last week reaching its lowest point since mid-September.
Over the past week, the state has averaged 24 COVID-19 deaths per week, up from 19 per day during the week earlier. The average number of daily deaths peaked at 155 during the week ending Dec. 8.
As of Thursday night, 1,302 people in Illinois were hospitalized with COVID-19, with 264 patients in intensive care units and 120 patients on ventilators, all up from a week earlier.
dpetrella@chicagotribune.com
jwhidden@chicagotribune.com
