Vaccination rates are lagging for Latino and Black Coloradans, as well as for men.
These two are exactly the kinds of people the state is hoping to reach now. They’re both young he’s 22, she’s 18 and from groups Latinx and Black Coloradans whose vaccination rates lag behind their share of the population.
But at least so far on this day last week at this site, they don’t have a lot of company. Nurse Hayley DeForest said it’s been pretty quiet.
“Demand, I feel like has gone down a little bit,” De Forest said. “It s just trying to figure out who still needs vaccines, because obviously, we have not vaccinated the entire population.”
However, Bent County currently has the highest 7-day incident rate in the state with 431.2 over the week, forcing Santa Fe Trail Day events and activities to go virtual for the second consecutive year and forcing the Las Animas High School football team to sit out the postseason.
When it comes to vaccine distribution, Crowley and Bent are the two lowest counties in Colorado when it comes to percentage of the counties’ population receiving one dose and the counties’ population that is fully vaccinated.
According to data from the CDC, Bent County has the lowest total population fully vaccinated in Colorado with only 5.7% of people, 317 people total.
According to Crowley/Otero Health Health Director Rick Ritter, that s no accident. It s been a long road, Ritter said. It s been arduous and difficult and just, you know, we re all ready for it to be over. And we re getting closer. We just need to keep doing what we re doing. Doing our part to make sure we keep the rates down. And it s (not just) individuals we don t want people to get sick but businesses depend on us. We don t want to see any of our businesses go the other way and have to have less customers and be shut down. Nobody wants to see that. It s like I say in our updates, it s up to us. And that means all of us.
People 16-49 with a high risk condition
Phase 2 includes the general public everyone 16 and older.
You can find a more detailed breakdown of who is in the state s different phases on the state s vaccine website.
Hart Van Denburg/CPR News
A vial of Moderna’s vaccine at the Otero County Health Department’s mass COVID-19 vaccination drive-through clinic for those 70 and older at the Arkansas Valley Fairgrounds in Rocky Ford on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021.
When does each phase begin, and how long will each phase take?
The majority of Phase 1A health care workers in the state were expected to be vaccinated by Jan. 15, according to an announcement from CDPHE on