COVID-19: Dentists, midwives, pharmacy technicians allowed to give vaccines

Article content

Dentists, midwives, pharmacy technicians and a raft of other health professionals will be recruited for mass vaccination clinics to open next month in B.C.

The provincial health officer, Dr. Bonnie Henry, said she issued a public health order on Tuesday that would make it easier for health authorities to hire for the 172 clinics set to open provincewide.

“We have run mass clinics before, and this is going to be a big scale. At a scale that we have not done in many, many years. And it will be prolonged,” Henry said.

“We are looking at large numbers of people, which is one of the reasons I put the order in today about being able to recruit people to work over time in these clinics, to provide different functions.”

Some of the clinics will need up to 500 staff.

Article content

Henry said that over the next two weeks health authorities would contact people aged 80 and over who are living independently or with some home support.

This triggers phase 2 of B.C.’s immunization plan and will include all hospital workers. Some of these immunizations will be in mass clinics, Henry said. Mass vaccination for younger age groups will start in April.

There are around 237,000 people aged 80 and over in B.C., making up five per cent of population. Many people in this age group have already received their vaccine as care-home residents.

There are 735,000 people in B.C. aged 30 to 39 — the largest cohort.

Specialty clinics, MSP lists and family physicians will be used to identify people aged 80 and over, Henry said.

“We recognize that not everybody who’s over the age of 80 and living at home, in community, or independent living has the same access to things like the Internet, a phone call or the ability to make those types of phone calls on their own so we are tackling it from a number of different ways,” Henry said.

“Whether that’s receiving a postcard in the mail, which some people will, or whether it’s getting access through the home care services you are being provided, whether it’s through your specialty clinic you’re involved with, through the independent living facility you live in.”

Article content

There will be no dedicated phone line to make immunization bookings.

Henry said she was concerned about slowly climbing average daily case counts and percentage positive test positivity. But she said there were many good signs, including a falling number of outbreaks at long-term care homes — proof the vaccines were effective — and just one death over the past day.

“We are seeing our way out of this pandemic, and part of the reason that we’re doing that is because we now have a really effective vaccine that works in older people, which is something that those of us who’ve been working in immunization for many, many years really find miraculous,” she said.

“By the time, we get to the summer we’re going to be in a different place.”

There are 4,677 active cases of COVID-19 in B.C., of which 238 are being treated in hospital, including 69 in intensive care.

Fewer than 60,000 people in B.C. have been fully vaccinated. The province has received 287,950 doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.

dcarrigg@postmedia.com

twitter.com/davidcarrigg

Get the latest COVID-19 news delivered to your inbox weeknights at 7 p.m. by subscribing to our newsletter here.

CLICK HERE to report a typo.

Is there more to this story? We’d like to hear from you about this or any other stories you think we should know about. Email vantips@postmedia.com.