Governor Outlines Minnesota’s Future COVID Vaccine Road Map
St. Paul, Governor Tim Walz today unveiled a road map for the remainder of Minnesota's COVID-19 vaccination program.
It is anticipated the state will have largely completed vaccinating people in the highest priority 1A phase of the program by the end of next month. That is when state health officials anticipate receiving enough doses of the vaccine to offer it to about 70-percent of Minnesotans 65 years and older. Walz says that is when people fitting into the next phase will begin entering the vaccination pipeline.
The plan announced at a news conference this afternoon would begin the next phase with people dealing with certain specific high-risk health conditions. That list includes people with sickle cell disease, Down Syndrome, active cancer treatment, people considered immunocompromised from organ transplant, and those oxygen-dependent due to chronic lung and heart conditions. It would also include targeted essential workers in the food processing industry.
Later in April or early May, people between the ages of 45 and 64 with one or more high-risk medical conditions and the younger people with two or more of those high-risk medical conditions would be eligible to receive the vaccine. It is also anticipated that additional essential frontline workers, including law enforcement and emergency responders, would also become eligible for the vaccine around that time, along with people 50 years and older living in multigenerational housing.
The late spring eligibility list covers people 18 and older with any underlying medical condition and anyone 50 and older, with or without health conditions. The final priority listing would be all other essential workers, who are expected to become eligible for the vaccine in June. Everyone else would begin receiving the vaccine in the early summer.
Governor Walz says the timeline is based on conservative estimates of vaccine supplies, suggesting that the schedule could be sped up if the vaccine makers continue to ramp up production and additional vaccines are approved.
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