It is very curious that Public Health Sudbury & Districts has not released the Pfizer vaccine to family doctors even though it has had a huge supply on hand, making it possible to open new walk-in clinics.
On May 19, Health Canada authorized Pfizer-BioNTech to store its vaccine at regular refrigerated temperatures for up to one month. This is a big deal.
Dr. Zain Chaglia, an infectious diseases physician at St Joseph’s Health Care in Hamilton, told CBC recently that changes to how the vaccine is stored could break down barriers to access in Canada, especially as second doses roll in.
Being able to store vaccine doses for a longer time makes it easier to transport the vaccine out of urban centre, and also means places that can host walk-in clinics, like doctor’s offices, pharmacies and pop-up clinics, can store doses for longer times and be able administer more of them.
This matters because of problems with Moderna, a vaccine that is as powerful as Pfizer, but is often unavailable from its supplier. Then there is AstraZenaca, a vaccine that has fallen out of favour with scientists. That has made Pfizer the favourite, even as huge quantities of the vaccine arrived on schedule in our communities.
Also in May, the Ontario government announced its pharmacy vaccine rollout by bringing Pfizer and Moderna into pharmacies for people 18 years of age and older. The same month, family doctors began to receive and vaccinate their patients with AstraZenaca and Moderna vaccine. No Pfizer.
Finally, on June 17, Sutcliffe notified primary care physicians that Pfizer was on the way. To date, no Pfizer vaccines have arrived in doctors’ offices.
Overall, about 75 per cent of area residents aged 18+ have received their first dose of a vaccine and 23 per cent of those aged 18+ have received their second dose. On the one hand, this is encouraging news. On the other hand, this means that about 25 per cent of adults in our community remain unvaccinated and 73 per cent need a second shot for optimal protection.
This is especially concerning when we hear about the recent Delta variant outbreak in the Timmins area and the outbreak at the North Bay jail. The number of active cases is slowly increasing in Sudbury.
After one shot, the vaccines do not offer good protection against the Delta variant. Dealing with the remaining unvaccinated and partially vaccinated is a priority, not only for them, but also for all children under 12 for whom there is so far no vaccine.
Our community needs all the help it can get to administer vaccines. I have connected with a number of seniors. They tell stories of lengthy periods on the phone trying to get through to Public Health. They talk of multiple attempts on multiple days. They checked out multiple pharmacies. Some went to communities outside of Sudbury. Some found spots where there was unused vaccine left at the end of the day.
Most recently, there are walk-in clinics with some individuals arriving hours before start time to get a good position in the waiting line.
Dr. Sutcliffe, please release the Pfizer vaccine to family doctors immediately. Share your vaccines. This is really key to vaccinating those members of the community who are not adept with computers and the internet, who have little free time to make contact on the telephone, who are not very mobile and who do not have a strong support system.
I helped a 90-year-old friend get an appointment and another friend drove her to the vaccination site. Physicians will surely help locate some of these individuals in need and get shots into their arms.
There is the issue of individuals who have objections to vaccination. Physicians whom they trust may be able to overcome some of that hesitancy.
We must make every effort to prevent individuals from falling through the cracks.
Dr. Peter Zalan is the former president of the medical staff at Health Sciences North, and a retired intensive care physician.
