As Gasconade County’s COVID-19 infection rate decreased for a third consecutive week, three larger-scale vaccination events were held over a six-day period last week.

“The number of new COVID-19 diagnosis per week decreased substantially for the third week in a row, ending the week with 39 new COVID diagnoses over the previous seven days,” according to Hermann Area District Hospital’s Dr. Michael Rothermich who has been providing testing services and tracking the pandemic’s numbers locally.  

The decrease in new infections detected locally also dropped the county’s seven-day cases per 100,000 ratio to under 10 percent.

“Taken together, recent data is great news and suggests an ongoing decrease in COVID-19 in our county,” Rothermich reports this week. “However, we are not yet to levels where the state would recommend large group activities, or that social distancing/mask use are not still critically important for prevent spread of disease.”

This good news comes after three vaccination clinics, two at churches and one at Hermann Middle School, delivered the first dose of either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines to at least 1,570 people. 

Gasconade County Health Department staff organized the event clinics Jan. 26 at Hermann United Methodist and Thursday at First Baptist Church in Owensville which each vaccinated 180 patients by appointment, according to Greg Lara, director of the health agency.

Between the previous Friday and Monday, Lara said his staff also administered 40 doses in small groups at their offices as a test run for scheduling and procedures.

“I wish we had enough to give everybody one,” said Lara about the initial delivery of 400 doses of the two-injection Moderna vaccine. He said there was an “uncertainty of whether or not we’ll get the vaccine or not.”

More mass vaccination clinics are being scheduled across the state involving hospitals and sites where large numbers of recipients can be processed.

The Columbia Daily Tribune reports Missouri will send 53 percent of its nearly 76,000 weekly vaccine doses to the hospitals. Another 23 percent will go to regional mass vaccination events supported by local groups and the Missouri National Guard. Another 8 percent will be allocated to local public health agencies, and another 8 percent will go to federally qualified health centers.

Hermann Area District Hospital, its community clinics, and the Gasconade County R-1 School District staged a two-day vaccination event in the Hermann Middle School gym which administered the first dose of the two-injection Pfizer product to 624 people on Saturday and 546 on Sunday.

“We were able to successfully extract a sixth dose from each five-dose vial with the specialized syringes we were issued from the state,” Rothermich noted in a recap of the weekend clinic at Hermann Middle School. “No doses had to be wasted, allowing us to give the maximum possible vaccines from the 104 vials we have used.”

Staff managed to call potential recipients throughout the afternoon on Saturday and booked all the remaining vaccination appointment spots for Sunday, according to Rothermich. With the remaining 91 vials, the clinic was able to vaccinate 546 more people on Sunday.

Health Department officials also worked with nursing homes and a retirement facility in the county to administer vaccines earlier in January to residents and staff.

In an email Monday, Rothermich said individuals are welcome to continue to leave their contact information through the link: https://forms.gle/GnYpmh3QoKmXr4qW9 

However, hospital personnel but will not be calling anyone else to schedule them for vaccination until they have confirmation of scheduled shipments of additional vaccine. 

“Over 1,850 people have filled out our contact information form,” Rothermich wrote in an email release issued late Friday afternoon. “We continue to have some people fill this out multiple times and ask that you not resubmit your information unless you have different contact information or realize you mis-categorized your eligibility.”

The Republican will post updates on its website as additional vaccination clinics are scheduled and announced either through the hospital or the health department.

“We have ordered more vaccine, and hope to be able to run additional mass vaccination events soon,” Rothermich wrote earlier this week.

The clinics at the churches and the school were all by appointment and appeared to run smoothly.

“We had a lot of help from the county’s ambulance districts,” said Lara of the assistance the church events received from Hermann and Owensville ambulance district personnel.

“Our vaccine clinic today was an overwhelming success and required a herculean effort from many people in the last few days, but all involved reporting it being extremely rewarding,” Rothermich reported. “Most people were vaccinated within 20 minutes of arriving, except for a small group of patients in the afternoon after we had a system-wide computer problem.  We greatly appreciated the patience of those affected individuals, who had a longer delay, while the issue was resolved.”