Ohio County COVID-19 Vaccination Clinic to Remain in Former Michaels Highland Store | News, Sports, Jobs
File photo by Scott McCloskey A COVID-19 vaccination site will remain at former Michaels in The Highlands.
The Wheeling-Ohio County Health Department’s vaccination clinic site in the Highlands has been on the move for a minute, but the clinic will remain in place in the building that once housed Michaels during the winter.
Health administrator Howard Gamble said on Friday the health department was in talks with the Ohio County Development Authority about a move to the Highlands as Michael’s building was going to be used in other retail purposes. Before the boxes could start moving, Gamble said the deal broke down.
“The development authority was working with a retail business to occupy old Michael’s, which was fine with us,†Gamble said. “It was a whole new retail business, and we were pretty excited. It’s awesome. But within 10 hours, he fell into the water. The county had informed us that we could come back and occupy Michael’s, at least until January 2022, for our recall program if and when it took off.
Gamble said the news that the clinic could stay at Michael’s was a small sigh of relief, as not only are their supplies and tables still set up there, but the old craft store has excess space of storage that the new store would not have. , which means they can store more materials on site. In particular, Gamble said there are many boxes of personal protective equipment
“Not only are our tables, chairs, wiring still there, there are several pallets of PPE in the store, and it’s PPE that we need to distribute to the community, businesses or operations that need gloves, gowns, masks, etc. â€Gamble mentioned. “We’re back at Michael’s for now, but we, like everyone else, are just waiting for the green light from the federal level.”
The health service is distributing third doses of the COVID-19 vaccine for severely immunocompromised people, currently available in the health service building at 1500 Chapline Street.
A booster, which is given to those who have already received the vaccine but whose immune response may have waned over time, was recommended by an FDA panel on Friday for people aged 65 and older.
“A lot of vaccines have boosters because over the years when they develop the vaccine they realize that the percentage of effectiveness has gone down, was not strong enough for the general population, and so we’re going to have a reminder, â€Gamble said. “… The job of a booster is to provide an additional level of immunity to an individual who has already been vaccinated.”
A booster injection reaffirms protection against the original disease, rather than adding specific protection against a given variant, Gamble said. The increased baseline protection is intended to provide a wide range of protection against variants.
“The hope is that if you get enough people vaccinated against the original COVID virus, any strain that is part of the COVID virus, if it develops, will be covered by the original vaccine. To give a new vaccine, like what we do with flu shots, we add (for example) H1N6, H4N3, and it’s a whole other process, these are the most common strains.
“It’s the same vaccine, the same composition, in the hope that you can control it enough to handle the cases, and that strains or variants don’t develop because too few people are vaccinated,” a- he added.
