By Beth Hundsdorfer
Community hospitals and health departments in the State will receive help from the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) and the Illinois Emergency Management Agency (IDEMA) to meet the health-care demand during a COVID-19 surge, by adding staff members to provide medical care and provide additional vaccines and testing sites.
The State will help ramp up COVID-19 testing, to operate six days a week beginning January 3, 2022 to increase availability.
“We are increasing testing and continuing to distribute monoclonal antibodies, anti-viral pills, and any treatments, or personal protective equipment communities need,” governor JB Pritzker said during a news conference Monday this week.
“I will continue to do everything possible to protect all the people of this State, whatever your vaccine status. But what kind of year 2022 turns out to be depends on all of us doing what is best for all of us.”
Pritzker was on a call with president Joe Biden and the National Governors Association Monday morning to discuss the response to the Omicron variant.
Vaccine clinics will be held in Cook, DuPage, Lake, Will, Kane, St. Clair, McLean, Sangamon, Peoria, Winnebago, Jackson and Adams Counties. Anyone age 12 older can get a first or second dose at these locations.
Community-based testing sites will be open Monday through Saturday in Aurora, Arlington Heights, South Holland, Fairview Heights, Peoria, Bloomington, Champaign, Harwood Heights, Rockford, and Waukegan.
Illinois Department of Public Health director Dr. Ngozi Ezike confirmed that Illinois is seeing higher hospitalization rates. The State is now averaging 500 hospital admissions a day due to COVID-19. While Illinois was still battling the Delta variant of COVID-19, the Omicron variant was introduced a couple of weeks ago. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) indicated earlier this month that the Omicron variant is the dominate strain of COVID-19 in the U.S. with more than 73% of new cases attributable to the variant.
To protect from the COVID-19, harm reduction strategies still will need to be employed, Ezike said, such as wearing masks, social-distancing, hand-washing, and staying away from large crowds.
“We have a vaccine that is highly- effective at preventing severe illness and death,” Ezike said. “Currently, we are seeing a demand for booster doses, but it is critically important for those who have yet to receive even one dose of vaccine to get vaccinated.”
The vast majority of cases, hospitalizations and deaths are among the unvaccinated, Ezike said.
Those most at risk:
• Are more than 65 years old.
• Suffer from heart, liver, or kidney, disease.
• Are Immunocompromised.
• Have diabetes.
Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service covering state government and distributed to more than 400 newspapers statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.
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