Virginia Senate passes bills to speed up vaccine rollout

The Virginia Senate voted 37-0 to approve a bill which facilitates the administration of the COVID-19 vaccine.

The bill, SB1445, will require the Department of Health to create a process where any health care provider in the Commonwealth who is qualified and available to administer the COVID-19 vaccine can volunteer to administer the vaccine to Commonwealth citizens.

Sen. Siobhan S. Dunnavant, R-Henrico, introduced the bill to the Senate.

“I think we all heard from our constituents how important it was to get this vaccine out as quickly as possible,” Dunnavant said in the Senate session. “This is our way of contributing to part of the solution for the state and that is to mobilize the ready workforce that we have, and so many available centers to set up vaccine centers.”

The bill will speed up distribution by eliminating licensing and legal barriers that prevent medical care workers from volunteering.

Virginia is already behind with vaccine rollout in comparison to other states and Virginians are beginning to get frustrated. Virginia has only administered 57.04% of the vaccines that have been distributed. Many have begun to put the blame on Gov. Northam.

As of Jan. 30, Virginia reported 4,309 new COVID-19 cases.

Del. Lamont Bagby, D-Henrico, proposed HB2333 which is similar to SB14445 with a few key additions and amendments. The bill passed in the Senate with a 15-0 vote Thursday morning.

HB2333 mandates data collection of race and ethnicity during vaccination, expands the definition of health care workers eligible to administer doses and creates more vaccination sites.

“The three main goals remain, and that's removing the barriers to allow health practitioners and students to volunteer to administer the COVID-19 vaccine, allowing for the creation of the vaccination sites, (and) requiring a data collection to ensure an equitable vaccination program and that's the part I am most excited about.” Bagby said.

HB2333 adds language to ensure reporting of race and ethnicity data into the Virginia immunization information system, Bagby said. It also clarifies that the process for volunteering as a vaccinator is only for the duration of the public health emergency.

The bill would allow any person licensed by the Virginia Department of Health Professions in the last 10 years who's in good standing to volunteer as a vaccinator. It was amended to 20 years in the committee meeting on Thursday morning.

Medical and nursing students enrolled in accredited programs within the state who've been properly trained in administering vaccines are also eligible to vaccinate.

“I can assure you nurses that are trained to give injections are fine to continue to do that,” Dunnavant said. “There are a lot of nurses out there who have reached out… and are willing to be a part of this workforce to vaccinate.”

As of now, Virginia needs to average at least 50,000 vaccinations per day in order to achieve herd immunity. With the lag of the current vaccine effort herd immunity is quite far off.