Shots coming to private care homes
By Hunter Cresswell
The COVID-19 vaccine is well on its way to reaching Gatineau Hills’ vulnerable people as the rollout gets underway, with private care homes and healthcare workers now in its sights.
All residents in public senior care homes – CHSLDs – in the Outaouais have been vaccinated, most healthcare workers can sign up for the jab, and now the local health administration CISSSO is aiming to inoculate the residents in private care homes.
According to Quebec’s COVID-19 website, 5,399 vaccines had been administered across the Outaouais region by Jan. 18; 153,539 had been administered province-wide by that same date.
“For the moment, we are not reaching the general population for vaccination. As soon as this is the case, we will inform by all possible means to reach the people concerned,” CISSSO spokeswoman Marie-Pier Després wrote in an email to The Low Down.
She was unable to provide the number of local CHSLD residents and staff who have been vaccinated.
“It is important to know that the vaccination of [care home] residents is done on-site, ” she wrote, explaining that they have a mobile team of vaccinators who go directly to the seniors' residences to vaccinate residents.
However, that’s not the case for workers.
“...They must make an appointment and get vaccinated at the CHSLD Lionel-Émond, which is the vaccination site for workers,” Després wrote.
In early-January, all the residents at the CHSLD des Collines in Masham and the Wakefield CHSLD were vaccinated, according to Després.
Vaccine triage
The province and CISSSO are vaccinating people against COVID-19 depending on their risk. Those higher at risk – CHSLD residents and healthcare/social workers – were the top two priority groups, so they were first and second in line, respectively, for the shot.
The next priority group to get vaccinated is private care home residents, followed by seniors, adults with chronic diseases, essential workers, then the rest of the population.
For more information, visit cisss-outaouais.gouv.qc.ca, and quebec.ca/coronavirus.