As suburban hospitals start receiving vaccines, state's second shipment to be cut in half
Gov. J.B. Pritzker said Wednesday federal officials notified him the state's second shipment of vaccine doses expected next week will be cut in half.
A reason for the shortfall was not given to health officials. The cut does not affect the first round of doses the state has already received.
Meanwhile, suburban hospitals in DuPage and Kane counties are gearing up to begin vaccinating staff members Thursday with doses they are receiving from the state's stockpile.
Officials at Elgin's Advocate Sherman Hospital reported they have received vaccines, and doses are expected to arrive Thursday at Edward Hospital in Naperville, Elmhurst Hospital and Advocate Good Samaritan Hospital in Downers Grove. The DuPage Medical Group, the largest independent, multi-specialty physician group in Illinois, said it has received its initial vaccine supply and plans to administer its first dose to front-line health care workers Thursday.
The vaccine has hit the suburbs. Our below has the numbers for DuPage County
— Daily Herald (@dailyherald)Hospital> in suburban Cook County and Lake County are receiving direct shipments of doses from Pfizer, health officials said. Those are expected to arrive Thursday as well.
As for the state's next allotment of the vaccine, Pritzker said federal authorities were expecting to ship out more than 8 million doses next week, but that has been reduced to 4.3 million doses nationwide. Future shipments may also be short of original expectations as well.
It will likely affect the way hospitals and long-term care facilities plan to inoculate workers and residents since the vaccine requires two doses 21 days apart.
Long-term care facilities will receive doses of the vaccine through local pharmacies, but Pritzker said those shipments might be delayed now, too.
"We need to recognize this is a complex process, and it's being handled as best it can be," Pritzker said.
The vaccine shortage news came as state health officials reported another 146 Illinois residents have died from COVID-19, while 7,123 new cases of the virus were diagnosed.
That brings the state's death toll to 14,655 and the number of residents infected to 870,600 since the outset of the pandemic.
The statewide infection rate continued to decline and stands at 8.5%, based on a seven-day average. That number is calculated by dividing the number of new COVID-19 cases diagnosed over seven days by the total tests processed in that time.
Also, the seven-day average infection rates in Chicago, suburban Cook County and the five other collar counties are all below 11% for the first time since Oct. 28, according to Illinois Department of Public Health records. DuPage County is reporting the lowest of those rates at 8.6%, and the highest is in Will County at 10.9%.
COVID-19 hospitalizations dropped by more than 170 patients Tuesday, according to health officials. Currently, 4,793 people are hospitalized statewide with complications from the virus.
All regions of the state are under heightened business operation and social gathering restrictions intended to help lower the spread of the virus. The governor said he plans to keep those restrictions in place indefinitely even if regions meet test positivity and hospital capacity goals that would allow them to loosen the restrictions.
Lake and McHenry counties' Region 9 have met those requirements, as have Region 1 in northwest Illinois and Region 6 in east Central Illinois.
"There is cause and effect to the mitigations we've put in place, and they've been proven time and time again, the scientists have been proven right and we've been following their advice," Pritzker said.
• Daily Herald staff writer Katlyn Smith contributed to this report.