PEORIA, Ill. — Phase one of COVID-19 vaccine distribution was ushered in Tuesday afternoon on a local level, as five OSF HealthCare workers were the first on the frontlines in Illinois to receive the shot.
Healthcare workers are a part of phase 1A of the distribution plan, along with long-term care facility residents.
Right behind, in phase 1B, are other essential frontline workers, including law enforcement officials.
Peoria County Sheriff Brian Asbell said plans to distribute the shot to said officials were still being ironed out.
“Even if you’re in tier 1A or 1B, you’re at the beginning stages of this,” he said. “There’s still a lot of strategy or pecking order the health department will have in place to try to keep this in an orderly fashion.
“I’m safe to say it’s going to be weeks, if not well over a month, before this group [gets access to the vaccine].
“There’s so many healthcare workers in front of the line of these first responders, and they rightly should. Their exposure per hour, per day is far greater than the police officers on the street.”
Much as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has outlined a tiered system of distributing the vaccine, the sheriff explained he will follow a similar system once the vaccine is available to PCSO staff.
“The jail is the most critical thing we have right now, and has the most exposure risk,” he said.
“So, when we go through this list, it’s going to be corrections, as well as the agency employees, such as nurses, dietitians, dietary kitchen workers, [and] sanitation. They would all go to the front of the line just because of the increased exposure risk, followed by patrol, and then we would start going down through our other divisions.
“The Peoria City Police will be doing the same thing. You’re first making a request to see who wants this so we can kind of get a head count so we know how many vaccinations are needed, and then we work with basically a triage system to see who goes first.”
Asbell estimated “roughly 40%” of his employees wanted to get the shot. He said he is encouraging all of them to get vaccinated, but it won’t be mandatory.
Similarly, he said, prisoners are in the upper tiers of people with the option to receive the vaccine, but also can’t be forced to get vaccinated.
Still, he said privileges can be taken away from prisoners who refuse the vaccination.
“There’s kind of a carrot there, I would think, that a lot of them would be more inclined to receive the vaccination,” he said.
The full interview with Asbell:
