Oregon governor Kate Brown's decision to give K-12 teachers and staff priority before the elderly for the COVID vaccines has been controversial to say the least.
I'm 73 and directly impacted.
Not incidentally, HUD data show that 41% of all Oregon HUD assisted rental households in 2020 had a head of household who was age 62 and above-so that's in excess of 20,000 senior households-many of them minorities- also impacted by Oregon's COVID vaccine priority system.
For the record, I am OK with on site teachers and staff being vaccinated before me.
The Plan, and the Problem
The Oregon announced "eligibility" start dates are 80+ year old residents on February 7, with 75+ becoming "eligible" on February 14, 70+ "eligible" on February 21, and 65+ "eligible" on February 28.
The week of February 7th DAILY 1st vaccine dosages available are 3,582 (over a seven day period) and they jump to 7,164 per day for the weeks that follow. [This equates to 25,075 1st doses in the first week, and 50,150 in the following weeks].
The problem is that these dosages do NOT keep up with the cascading weekly increase in the "eligible" elderly population.
In short, "Eligibility" does NOT EQUAL availability.
I have prepared a 2 page PDF file with a graph and table HERE [and embedded below] that shows the weekly percentages of the total elderly "eligible" population served for the next 16 weeks.
Observations:
When the second elderly "eligible" group (75-79) becomes "eligible" on February 14th the total "eligible" elderly swells to 301,295, but cumulative 1st dosages available number only 32,238. So as of that date only 11% of the eligible elderly will have that first dose available.
When my age group (70-74) become "eligible" on February 28th the total eligible elderly population increases to 507,735 but available cumulative doses total only 82,386. That means that only 17% of the "eligible" elderly as of that date will have had that first dose available [and there will be 425,349 now "eligible" elderly people WITHOUT an available 1st dose].
Reaching just 50% of the total eligible elderly population of 765,541 is projected for April 4. That is the 9th week, and the 57th day of the first elderly group "eligibility".
First dosages are projected to catch up to the total eligible elderly population on Friday May 28th. That's in the 16th week, and the 111 day of the first elderly "eligibility". (Completion of the second dose should take 3-4 weeks longer, to mid to late June).
I think the focus on the start dates for "eligibility" is highly misleading and will cause confusion and distrust that could have been avoided by focusing more realistically on how long the roll out will take.
Increased dosage availability and reducing the count of the elderly population by the number of elderly already receiving their first dose by February 7th could decrease the time periods shown. Conversely, geographic and other distribution problems, and reluctant and anti-vaccination issues could extend the elderly roll out even longer.
After the elderly there will be more than 3 million Oregonians left to vaccinate. At 50,000 first dosages a week it would take 60 weeks AFTER the late May elderly 1st dosages are completed for the total 1st round of dosages to be complete. That would be July of NEXT year.
Even if 1st dosages available were doubled to 100,000 per week beginning in June, this would still mean that 3 million additional 1st dosages would not be completed until January of 2022.
Originally created and posted on the Oregon Housing Blog.
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