Health |

As Vice President Kamala Harris visits city’s COVID-19 vaccination facility for union workers, Mayor Lori Lightfoot says Chicago will meet President Joe Biden’s call to open vaccine eligibility to all US adults by April 19

Vice President Kamala Harris, joined by Illinois’ top Democrats, touted efforts to expand vaccination sites in underserved communities Tuesday as the White House announced all adults in the U.S. will be eligible for vaccines by April 19 rather than May 1.

Harris, making a brief visit to Chicago en route to Washington from her home state of California, toured a vaccination site run by the Chicago Federation of Labor for union workers as she invoked the spring season and “a sense of renewal” despite times of isolation and death from the pandemic.

“We see light at the end of the tunnel because we’ve gone through so much as a nation,” Harris said.

“We are not alone. We are all in this together,” she said, adding that organized labor knows that better than anyone.

“You know the power of the collective. You know the importance and the strength of people standing together,” she said. “We’re all here to make a statement we understand the significance of getting vaccinated, that it’s bigger than us.”

It was Harris’ first trip to Chicago since the former U.S. senator was sworn in as vice president on Jan. 20 and came at the invitation of Mayor Lori Lightfoot. Harris was joined at the vaccination site, the headquarters of the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 399 in Chinatown, by a group of Democrats that included Lightfoot, Gov. J.B. Pritzker, U.S. Sens. Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth and U.S. Rep. Danny Davis.

At the vaccination site, Harris watched as Lucio Polanco, a window washer with Local 1 of the Service Employees International Union, was vaccinated in front of a CFL and Protect Chicago Plus banner.

“That’s hard work!” she said, in response to his job. “That’s high-skilled work, it is, a lot of skill involved.”

Harris asked what the tallest building he’d washed was and he said Trump Tower. Durbin joked, “Bring the sign down.”

While Harris’ visit was aimed at helping promote the expansion of vaccination opportunities, it also came as new cases of COVID-19 continue to spike in Chicago and across the nation.

That has prompted fears that the spread of coronavirus and its variants will create a deadly next wave of the pandemic and force the reinstitution of mitigation efforts such as business shutdowns.

In Chicago, the seven-day rolling average of daily cases and the positivity rate have exceeded 400 and 5%, respectively — public health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady’s threshold of concern.

The city’s caseload was at 597, up 24% from last week, and the positivity rate rose from 4.2% to 5.1%, as of Monday’s numbers. The average daily number of tests taken in the city went up only 8% during the past week.

Statewide, the seven-day positivity rate for cases as a share of total tests — the positivity rate — was at 3.9% as of Monday, the highest level since the same rate was reported the week ending Feb. 1.

At the same time, city public health officials said daily emergency department visits also crept up to a “very high risk” category at 99, as of last week’s data. Intensive care units are averaging just below the “moderate risk” ceiling of 100 beds.

The city also updated its travel orders, adding four states including Iowa as well as Washington, D.C., to its restrictive list. Now, people who visit 24 states and D.C. are asked to quarantine for 10 days or have a negative test result when returning to Chicago if they have not been fully vaccinated.

Along with Harris’ visit, federal officials announced the release of $124 million for expanded vaccination efforts in Illinois, including more than $33.8 million for Chicago. The Centers for Disease Control said the funding can be used for “innovative partnerships with community-based organizations” to increase vaccinations, including in underserved populations.

Such was the case with the vaccination site Harris toured, which is being operated by the Chicago Federation of Labor at the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 399 headquarters at 2260 S. Grove St. The White House called the location the nation’s first vaccination site operated by union members for union members.

Harris called the site “a model for the country” and praised labor for creating a space where “the dignity of work is recognized.”

Robert Reiter, president of the Chicago Federation of Labor, said officials expected to vaccinate 800 union members with Johnson & Johnson shots throughout Tuesday. Reiter said they were looking to provide 2,400 shots this week after injecting 1,200 last week.

Almost two-thirds of the union members expected to get shots on Tuesday are people of color, Reiter said.

Harris’ visit, along with a trip by President Joe Biden to an Arlington, Virginia, vaccination site, came as the White House moved up its timeline for vaccinations of adults 16 and older to April 19 from May 1.

Illinois, outside Chicago, already had been scheduled to open up vaccinations of that group on Monday, but within the last two weeks, 84 of the state’s 102 counties had already made that group eligible. City officials had been sticking with a May 1 eligibility date.

Lightfoot said later that the city would meet Biden’s April 19 date to open enrollment but said the city lacks the necessary vaccines to deliver the shots then and called for more vaccine doses to be delivered to Chicago.

“We want people to go and sign up when it’s their turn, but given the supply of vaccine, it may be a few weeks or so before they get an appointment to be able to come in,” Lightfoot said. “So we just caution with folks to be patient, and in the meantime, to be diligent.”

Lightfoot emphasized, “I want to be clear that when we open up on April 19, that doesn’t mean that very day everybody’s going to get access to vaccine.”

The White House also announced that the U.S. has reached 150 million COVID-19 vaccine doses in the first 75 days of the new Biden administration. Biden originally had pledged 100 million doses in the first 100 days of his presidency and has since doubled that goal.

The White House also ruled out on Tuesday a government-issued “vaccination passport” to provide proof of vaccination, but said private companies may move forward with their own type of credential. Republicans had raised the specter of such a document as government “Big Brotherism.”

“The government is not now, nor will we be supporting a system that requires Americans to carry a credential,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters. “There will be no federal vaccinations database and no federal mandate requiring everyone to obtain a single vaccination credential.”

The new federal money announced Tuesday, on top of $150 million the state received for previous vaccination efforts, would be used for grants that include local health departments, community-based organizations and expansion of mobile vaccination teams, state public health officials said.

After the event with Harris, Lightfoot, Pritzker and other Democrats were scheduled to convene for a news conference at the field house in nearby Ping Tom Park, but it was abruptly ended when protesters arrived to demonstrate against police over the killing of 13-year-old Adam Toledo.

Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez, 25th, joined protesters in the lobby as they chanted “let the aldermen in” and engaged in a standoff with police.

Pritzker did not show up after the mayor’s office canceled the event. Davis, Durbin and Duckworth arrived at the field house anyway and spoke briefly before it became clear Lightfoot was not attending. The mayor spoke later with reporters at City Hall.

The Tribune’s Dan Petrella, Jenny Whidden and Alice Yin contributed.

gpratt@chicagotribune.com

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