Nearly all Allegheny County seniors at least partially vaccinated against covid, health official says

Almost all senior citizens in Allegheny County are at least partially vaccinated against covid-19, a virus that ravaged the older population, including those in care facilities, both locally and nationwide, officials said.

Allegheny County Health Director Dr. Debra Bogen noted the milestone after a tour of UPMC’s vaccine and testing clinic on Pittsburgh’s South Side on Tuesday, saying “nearly 100%” of residents aged 65 and up have received at least one shot.

“These vaccines really work,” Bogen said. “They’re what we really need to overcome this virus.”

Across the state, health care providers have given more than 11.2 million vaccinations, and nearly 61% of all Pennsylvanians have received their first dose. Around 57.5% of residents over 18 are fully vaccinated.

The state Department of Health’s vaccine data dashboard breaks down age groups more narrowly than just “65 and older.” The breakdown for partial and full vaccinations for all Pennsylvanians over 65 is:

• Age 65-69: 19.4% partially covered, 68% fully covered
• Age 70-74: 20.2% partially covered, 72.3% fully covered
• Age 75-79: 15.6% partially covered, 70.9% fully covered
• Age 80-84: 15.4% partially covered, 71.1% fully covered
• Age 85 and up: 15.4% partially covered, 65.4% fully covered.

In Westmoreland County, the breakdown is:

• Age 65-69: 17% partially covered, 67.6% fully covered
• Age 70-74:19% partially covered, 70.4% fully covered
• Age 75-79: 14.2% partially covered, 67.2% fully covered
• Age 80-84:14.2% partially covered, 69.4% fully covered
• Age 85 and up: 14.5% fully covered, 66.7% fully covered

Gov. Tom Wolf last month said he would lift the state’s mask mandate when 70% of adults are fully vaccinated, and that has since been updated to either 70% fully vaccinated or June 28 – whichever comes first.

Acting Physician General Dr. Denise Johnson, who also toured the South Side clinic, said she thinks the state can still hit the 70% benchmark prior to June 28.

“It really depends on Pennsylvanians continuing (to get vaccinated) at the rate that we’ve had,” she said.

Even with that benchmark in sight, she said, the push for vaccinations won’t stop.

“We know that there are some areas where the vaccination rate is lower than that overall Pennsylvania number,” Johnson said. “We are not going to be stopping when we hit that number.”

People are still getting sick, she said, and people are still dying.

The Department of Health on Tuesday reported 453 new cases of the virus, bringing the running total to more than 1.21 million. Just over 500 people were hospitalized across the state, and 130 were in intensive care. Twenty-four more deaths were reported, for a total of 27,514.

Dr. Donald Yealy, UPMC’s chief medical officer, said the “vast majority” of people admitted to UPMC hospitals for covid-19 are either unvaccinated or not fully vaccinated. He said there are occasionally fully vaccinated people who are hospitalized with the virus, so-called breakthrough cases.

“We knew that would happen,” he said. “It doesn’t mean it’s a failure of vaccines in general. That can happen for a lot of different reasons. Most of those people have another underlying condition that makes it understandable why, and they still do better than what we were seeing before.”