Ottawa health-care workers will have finished administering the first round of COVID-19 vaccines in all of the city’s 28 long-term care homes by the end of the day on Friday, according to Mayor Jim Watson.
The milestone in Ottawa’s vaccine distribution campaign means each resident and staff member of a long-term care home who wanted the jab will have received an initial dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Each recipient will be eligible to receive the second dose of the vaccine after a period of 21 to 28 days.
The Ottawa Hospital said last week it would have to temporarily pause its vaccine clinic over the weekend due to a lack of supply, but was able to resume its vaccination campaign on Tuesday after receiving a new shipment of doses from the province.
Mobile teams of health-care workers including pharmacists, nurses and paramedics have been working with front-line care workers in long-term care homes to administer the vaccine to any willing resident.
The city released a video on Twitter this week showing the inoculation process from fridge to injection.
Dr. Vera Etches, the city’s top doctor, said earlier this month that she expects the effects of distributing the vaccine throughout Ottawa’s long-term care homes to make an impact on the city’s coronavirus hospitalizations and death rates in February.
Next on the list of vulnerable populations slated to receive the vaccine are residents of at-risk retirement homes in Ottawa.
Ottawa expects to vaccinate up to 680,000 residents in the first half of 2021, depending on the supply of vaccines coming down from the province.
Procurement Minister Anita Anand announced Friday morning that Pfizer’s vaccine production will briefly stall in Europe, which is expected to delay the flow of doses into Canada.
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