How Philly area hospitals plan to distribute the vaccine to their staffs

The Philadelphia Department of Public Health will receive an allotment from the federal government and divvy up the number of doses to the city’s hospitals.

• Nina Feldman/WHYY
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  Nina Feldman covers behavioral health for WHYY. She grew up in Ann Arbor Michigan, but before coming to Philadelphia she lived in New Orleans, where she worked at American Routes and contributed to the NPR affiliate WWNO. She likes to understand neighborhoods, watch friends do what they’re good at, and be underwater. She also started the New Orleans Ladies Arm Wrestling league, or NO LAW.

(Philadelphia) — Hospitals in the Philadelphia region have known their frontline workers would be first in line to receive the COVID-19 vaccine once it got the green light from the Food and Drug Administration. Until that happened, they weren’t just going to sit around and wait.

So hospitals have spent the last few weeks making arrangements — from ultra-cold storage, to prioritizing who goes first, to creating inoculation rotations so they are poised to vaccinate their workers as soon as the first round of doses arrive.

Now that the first vaccine, from Pfizer, has been endorsed by an FDA advisory panel, with emergency use authorization by the agency imminent, shipments will likely arrive in the coming days. Health systems are kicking their plans into gear, scheduling staff members to sign up for their first shots Wednesday and Thursday of next week.

The Philadelphia Department of Public Health will receive a vaccine allotment from the federal government and divvy up the number of doses to the city’s hospitals. The same will happen at the state level for hospitals outside the city. Health systems such as Einstein Medical and Jefferson Health, which have campuses in both Philadelphia and the surrounding counties, will coordinate between the city and state. While most states have released detailed plans on vaccine prioritization and distribution, Pennsylvania is one of only four that did not.

James Garrow, spokesperson for the city’s Health Department, said the number of 975-dose vaccine shipments, nicknamed “pizza boxes” for their shape, that Philadelphia would receive was still in flux.

“Every time we ask the federal government, we get a different number,” Garrow said. “They keep telling us the number will not be final until the vaccines are put onto a truck.”

With emergency use authorization likely coming soon, that should be happening any minute.

Who gets it first

No hospital expects to receive enough doses to vaccinate its entire workforce in the first shipment, so it must create tiers to prioritize its staff.

Philadelphia’s Department of Public Health has recommended that hospitals give first dibs to health care workers who have the highest risk exposure to COVID-19-positive people — but how each institution defines that is up to the individual hospital.

Einstein Medical Center expects to receive a total of four “pizza boxes” in this first round — two for its Philadelphia campus and one each for Einstein Montgomery County in East Norriton and Einstein Elkins Park. Highest priority there will go to those working in the ICU and emergency departments, including those performing aerosolizing procedures such as intubating patients. The first tier at Einstein will also include supporting roles in those areas, like security and food service personnel, as well as pharmacy workers.

Penn Medicine will also include all workers — not just doctors and nurses — in high-exposure areas in the first tier.

In the following rounds, Einstein plans to offer the vaccine to anyone in the hospital caring for COVID-19 patients, and after that, those working in outpatient settings.

In a note to staff sent Thursday, Temple University Health System president and CEO Michael A. Young noted that 3,000 of its more than 10,000 employees meet one of two high-risk categories the hospital will prioritize for the first round of vaccines: those whose work assignment puts them at risk of close contact with confirmed COVID-positive patients for more than 15 minutes, and those who work in departments where the COVID-positivity rate has been higher than 10%.

Jefferson will offer the vaccine first to clinical employees at the highest risk of COVID-19, such as those in the emergency departments, ICUs and COVID units, according to an email sent to staff Tuesday. It anticipates receiving its first batch next week in Pennsylvania and the week of Dec. 21 in New Jersey.

Though none of these hospitals plan to mandate the vaccine, their administrations encourage workers to get it.

“We strongly believe that a protected frontline provider/staff workforce honors our highest professional obligation to the safety and well-being of our patients,” wrote Temple Health CEO Young, noting that even those who have recovered from the disease should get the vaccine.

 

WHYY is the leading public media station serving the Philadelphia region, including Delaware, South Jersey and Pennsylvania. This story originally appeared on WHYY.org.