Low-hanging fruit.
That’s what the first half of the COVID-19 vaccination effort has been for state health officials.
North Carolina just passed the halfway mark – with over 50 percent of its adult population at least partially vaccinated. However, so far, it’s been a breeze getting the public into chairs and getting shots into arms.
Doing the same for the remaining half of the population is a much more daunting task. Vaccines are readily available everywhere North Carolinians turn – but some sites have few to no takers, and some counties in the state have been declining or returning vaccines so that those doses don’t go to waste. Two months ago, that would have been unimaginable.
On Thursday, May 6, state health officials noted that the halfway mark was a good place to be.
“This is a significant milestone toward our goal of stopping the spread of COVID-19 and bringing summer back to North Carolina,” NC Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mandy Cohen stated in a press release announcing the midpoint of the vaccination process.
Now the department is turning its attention toward those who are harder to convince. One thing state officials are doing is putting a more positive spin on how things will be once more state residents get vaccinated.
“I hope you will join the more than 4 million people who have taken their shot and help put this pandemic behind us,” Cohen said to the unvaccinated.
State health officials point out that, if the vaccination effort is successful enough, the state will lift mandatory social distancing, capacity and mass gathering restrictions on June 1. The state has set a goal to get two-thirds of adults vaccinated with at least one shot in order to lift the indoor mask mandate and lighten other public health recommendations. The timeline for this benchmark will be determined by how quickly North Carolinians get vaccinated.
So far, about 7.5 million vaccine doses have been administered in the state and about three-quarters of the population over 65 years of age is fully vaccinated.
Nearly 40 percent of the state’s total population – regardless of age – has received at least one dose of a vaccine.
Now there’s an all-out effort on the local, state and federal level to convince the unvaccinated – who range from liberal soccer moms to conservative Trump followers to minorities who don’t trust the government thanks to the Tuskegee Experiments.
The state and Guilford County are working to ensure that receiving a COVID-19 vaccine is easy and convenient for anyone 16 and older. The vaccine is widely available through a variety of providers, usually now with no wait time and without the need for an appointment. State officials emphasize that you can find a vaccine in your area by using the Find a Vaccine Location tool online or by calling 888-675-4567.
Dr. Mandy Cohen and Supreme Leader Cooper keep moving the metrics and ruling thru decree following some science sometimes when they feel like it. Remember “we just need a brief pause to flatten the curve and to make sure we have PPP and our hospitals aren’t overrun.” . That was over a year ago. Vaccines are available but Supreme Leader and his Dr DHHS enabler refuse to open our state and instead want and insist on nonsensical, arbitrary , and capricious onerous decrees. How long can one man claim emergency powers especially when the emergency never ends? Woke despotism.
Civil disobedience is the solution, but there are too many sheep. This of Govt by decree. Autocratic.
I volunteer to be in the control group. Every live, human trial of an experimental vaccine should have one. Don’t hate me, it is for the Science.
“… stopping the spread of COVID-19 and bringing summer back to North Carolina,”
Summer was gone? Where’d it go?
My summer of 2020 was fine. A lot less people out there because they were holed up at home, scared s#!tless was fine by me. Cheap gas made travel a bargain, to boot.
I am all for the Covid vaccine and I have gotten mine. Glad for it. My question is this: so what is the cost for each vaccination and who is picking up the tab? I would be curious in who is the big time in investors.
We The People are picking up the tab, same as all the unnecessary tests. I’d like to know who’s brother-in-law got rich off of all of us.
I’m guessing Kushner’s and Trump’s.
Okay, so most of the sheep have taken the untested experimental operating system – as Moderna calls it. The Jesuits have done a great job indoctrinating the US population. I cannot believe the stupidity of the public to believe that they need an untested experimental vaccine for a flu virus that has a 99.8% survival rate. So, it will be the vaccinated people that start dying this Fall when flu season starts due to antibody dependent enhancement (ADE) that the vaccine caused – then they will blame a variant and the unvaccinated as the cause. Prior animal studies proved to be fatal with coronavirus vaccines due to ADE. The studies are out there folks. If you’ve already received one of the operating systems there is no hope for you now. If you don’t die suddenly you will develop one, or more, diseases which will slowly kill you and the MD gods will not blame the vaccine. You really did it to yourself this time. No going back now. Hopefully, this will be read by the unvaccinated and they may think twice about taking these kill shots. Over 3,500 reported deaths so far from VAERS and this system only captures less than 1% of adverse effects, per Harvard Medical School.
The summer of 2020 I did not go any where, except to Myrtle Beach, for a week in late September. This summer 2021 I plan to travel as much as passible at least 2 week each month. June, July, Aug. and September.