South Brunswick Working With County To Secure COVID Vaccines

SOUTH BRUNSWICK, NJ — With COVID-19 vaccine being administered across the state, the South Brunswick Office of Emergency Management said they are coordinating with Middlesex County Health Department and State officials to plan vaccine distribution.

Officials said they have coordinated with South Brunswick volunteers and paid EMS organizations to ensure they have access to the vaccinations.

Currently the vaccine program in South Brunswick is being rolled out step-by-step with different populations having access to the vaccine at different times.

While there is a ‘mega site’ coming up at Raritan Center, Edison, there are plans to include additional sites distributed across Middlesex County. Officials said the additional sites have not been finalized yet. Middlesex County has received a limited supply of the vaccine, which is shipped to different centers regularly.

Officials in South Brunswick said in the coming weeks, the supply chain will “evolve into a more reliable distribution of a specific number of units, on a specific time interval, to allow for longer-term planning.”

Here’s the current vaccine distribution timeframe:

Phase 1A (January)

• Health care workers, paid and unpaid, serving in healthcare settings, who have the potential for direct or indirect exposure to patients or infectious materials.
• Long-term care residents and staff.
• Non-hospital-based healthcare personnel and residents of other long-term care settings

Phase 1B (January - February)

• Frontline essential workers and people over 75 years of age.

Phase 1C (March - April)

• Essential workers, adults between the ages of 65 to 74, and persons aged 16 to 64 with medical conditions that increase the risk for COVID-19.

Phase 2 (May – June)

• General Population

Like the rest of the state, the Middlesex County Health Department is currently in Phase 1A of the program.

Meanwhile on Tuesday, New Jersey opened its vaccination registration portal. The portal allows NJ residents to pre-register for the vaccine, and they will be contacted when they become eligible to receive it.

Here's the link to the registration portal: https://covidvaccine.nj.gov/

More COVID-19 cases and one death

For the week of Dec. 20 to 26, the rate of COVID-19 cases hit a new high in South Brunswick.

Officials reported 111 new cases of residents testing positive and one death – a man in his 60s. This is the largest number of new cases reported in a single week over the course of the pandemic.

Additionally, 20 cases were reported from previous weeks.

Last week, 91 new COVID cases were reported in South Brunswick - an 18 percent decrease from the week of Dec. 20 to 26.

However, officials said this was the second largest number of new cases reported in a single week since the pandemic. In addition, 28 cases were reported from previous weeks.

South Brunswick currently has 1,372 cases of residents who have tested positive.

The total fatality county stands at 38.

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