Kentucky Health News
Kentuckians 75 and older have a "very compelling argument" to be among those next in line to get coronavirus vaccines, Gov. Andy Beshear said Monday as vaccinations began at nursing homes in the state.
Last week, Beshear said that after nursing-home workers, staff and other health-care workers, the next group would be first responders and K-12 educators. Sunday, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advisory committee said the next group should also include people 75 and older, as well as workers key to the function of society, including teachers, police officers, firefighters, corrections officers and grocery workers.
Beshear said he is "actively considering" adding people over 74 to the next group because the CDC "makes a very compelling argument," and in Kentucky, "our mortality rates are more attached to age" than in most other states.
More than 1,600 residents of Kentucky long-term-care facilities -- skilled-care nursing homes, personal-care homes and assisted-living facilities -- have died of Covid-19, two-thirds of the state's overall total.
Because they are "by far the most vulnerable population that Covid-19 preys upon," Beshear said as he announced that Walgreens and CVS began vaccinating nursing-home residents early Monday morning.
The mortality rate is so high, Beshear said, that the vaccine "will save lives, beginning today."
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