Pasadena Officials Preparing for Rollout of COVID-19 Vaccines

While public distribution of vaccines is likely still months away, city officials are already making preparations for their arrival.

“We are currently planning a multi-faceted COVID-19 vaccination campaign to ensure safe and equitable access once for all Pasadena residents once the vaccines are available,” Pasadena Public Health Emergency Manager Adrienne Kim said in a video statement.

Thirty-five new infections were detected in Pasadena on Tuesday, and no new deaths were reported, according to city data.

The city has seen a total of 3,746 cases of the virus and 132 deaths since the onset of the pandemic in March.

Over the prior week, Pasadena saw an average of 41.7 new infections each day, city data shows.

Huntington Hospital reported treating 63 COVID-19 patients on Tuesday.

Los Angeles County recorded the highest number of COVID-19 infections ever at 7,593, while health officials in Pasadena made preparations to distribute vaccines that are expected to become available over the coming months.

During the H1N1 flu pandemic of 2009, public health officials made successful use of Medical Points of Dispensing, or MPODs, to distribute vaccinations through the local community, she explained.

“Since then, we have conducted MPOD exercises every year and have enhanced our plans to transform a location, such as a school, parking lot, or community center, into a large vaccine clinic and offer vaccines by drive-through or walk-up methods,” according to Kim.

“Although we don’t expect COVID-19 vaccines to be available to the general public until well into 2021, the Pasadena Public Health Emergency Preparedness team has already been hard at work planning COVID vaccine MPODs,” she said. “We are securing sites, connecting with community partners, and of course, staying up to date on the rapidly involving information about the various vaccines our community may receive.”

More information will be released as it comes, Kim said.

“We will continue to communicate with you and keep you informed about when, where and how you will have access to a COVID-19 vaccine in accordance with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention vaccine playbook,” she said. “In the meantime, we so appreciate everyone doing their part by washing hands, masking and social distancing.”

The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health announced “the highest number of new COVID-19 cases and people hospitalized with COVID-19 that L.A. County has ever experienced throughout the pandemic,” the agency said in a written statement. Forty-six new fatalities were reported.

The county has recorded a total of 408,396 cases of novel coronavirus and 7,700 deaths.

“The number of new COVID-19 cases significantly surpassed the previous high of 6,124 new cases seen last week, and signals that the virus is infecting more people at a faster rate than ever seen in L.A. County before,” according to the statement. “The daily test positivity rate today is almost 12 percent, up from 7 percent one week ago.”

Officials reported more than 2,300 patients were hospitalized with COVID-19 countywide on Tuesday, with 24 percent of them being treated in intensive care units, according to county health officials.

“This exceeds the peak of 2,232 people hospitalized with COVID-19 during the July surge,” the county statement said. “The daily number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 has increased nearly every day since Nov. 1 when the daily number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 was 799.”

L.A. County Director of Public Health Barbara Ferrer said the situation was bad. And it was almost certainly going to get worse.

“Today, Tuesday, Dec. 1, 2020, is the worst day thus far of the COVID-19 pandemic in Los Angeles County,” she said. “However, it will likely not remain the worst day of the pandemic in Los Angeles County. That will be tomorrow, and the next day and the next as cases, hospitalizations and deaths increase.”

“Every resident and every business needs to take immediate action if we are to dampen this alarming surge. We are in the middle of an accelerating surge in a pandemic of huge magnitude,” according to Ferrer. “This is not the time to skirt or debate the safety measures that protect us because we need every single person to use every tool available to stop the surge and save lives.”

State public health officials reported 12,221 new infections and 70 new deaths on Tuesday, raising the statewide totals to 1,225,189 documented cases of COVID-19 and 19,211 deaths.

The state’s average positivity rate over the prior week had climbed to 7 percent, while the 14-day average was recorded at 6.5 percent, according to a California Department of Public Health statement.

As of Tuesday, L.A. County represented 33 percent of California’s COVID-19 infections and 40 percent of the state’s fatalities.