BUFFALO (WBEN) - The Erie County Department of Health has partnered with Oishei Children's Hospital to host a vaccine clinic this Saturday (11/26) exclusively for 5-11 year olds from 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.
On Tuesday, the CDC expanded COVID-19 vaccine recommendations to about 28 million children in the United States in this age group, which allows providers to proceed with vaccinations immediately.
"As a pediatrician, I'm celebrating this," said Erie County Health Commissioner Dr. Gale Burstein Wednesday. "We are busy organizing clinics to make sure we have access to everybody in the community who decide not to go to their pediatrician to get that vaccine - we just want to make it easy for people."
Burstein said the county received a shipment of roughly 2,000 doses of the vaccine Wednesday morning. Registration is required, and to do so, parents are urged to call 716-858-2929. Burstein added that they're currently waiting on New York to modify the state registration system, and she hopes that will be made available starting Thursday.
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Also discussed at Wednesday's COVID briefing, local numbers appear to again be heading in the wrong direction. There were a total of 2,359 cases confirmed in the last seven days, and COVID hospital cases have jumped from 111 to 145 in the past two weeks.
"We have seen an increase in deaths in the past few weeks," said Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz. "The sad part with the increase in hospitalizations just in the last four or five days, that generally means we're going to see an increase in deaths in probably 10 days. When hospital numbers go up, ICU numbers go up, and usually within 10 days to two weeks after, the deaths have gone up too, so I'm very concerned that we will see an increase in deaths about a week-and-a-half from now."
