PA Long-Term Care Facilities To Get Coronavirus Vaccine Next Week

PENNSYLVANIA — Residents and staff members of 2,283 skilled nursing and assisted living facilities in Pennsylvania will begin receiving the coronavirus vaccine on Dec. 28. CVS Health pharmacy workers will administer the vaccinations, which will begin at similar facilities in 12 other states this week.

CVS Health and Walgreens are the two providers the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services authorized to administer the inoculations. CVS on Monday said the company expects to vaccinate as many as four million residents and staff at 40,000 long-term care facilities nationwide.

CVS teams will make multiple visits to each long-term care facility to provide the initial shot and booster. The majority of residents and staff will be fully vaccinated three to four weeks after the first visit, depending on whether they receive the Pfizer or Moderna vaccination.

CVS Health expects to complete the vaccination effort in approximately 12 weeks.

“Vaccinating one of our most vulnerable populations is the latest milestone in our multifaceted pandemic response, which includes testing more than 10 million people for the virus since March,” Karen S. Lynch, CVS Health executive vice president, said in a news release. “The eventual availability of COVID-19 vaccines in communities across the country will bring us one step closer to overcoming the most significant health challenge of our lifetime.”

CVS will administer coronavirus vaccinations starting this week in Connecticut, Florida, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, and Vermont. Vaccinations will begin next week in Pennsylvania, 36 other states and the District of Columbia.

CVS eventually plans to make the vaccine available at all of its locations nationwide subject to product availability and prioritization of populations, which will be determined by individual states. Retail setting vaccines will be offered on an appointment-only basis via CVS.com or through the CVS Pharmacy app, and there will be a dedicated 800 number for people without online access.

CVS said it has the capacity to administer as many as 25 million shots per month.

Last week, Pennsylvania hospitals were slated to receive more than 100,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine. The shots were administered to frontline healthcare workers, as per the state's coronavirus vaccine plan.