The COVID-19 vaccine is slowly trickling into the Phase 1 sites: the hospitals, and now the long-term care facilities. What many nursing home directors are wondering is why didn’t the nursing homes get the vaccine in mid-December when the hospitals got it. It’s January and the first rounds of the vaccine are starting to arrive.

“Our residents are frail and elderly and they have been allowed to remain at risk,” said Alicia Silliman, the administrator of Hometown Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Tamaqua.

The Hometown Nursing Home received vaccines Sunday.

According to data in the state’s COVID-19 Interim Vaccination Plan, 9.2% of the people who became infected by the virus as of Dec. 8, 2020, were residents in long-term care facilities, but 60.6% of the COVID-19 deaths were from that very same population.

Both Silliman and Drew Lutton, the administrator of Pleasant Valley Manor Care Center in Stroudsburg, blame the state for the delays.

“I’m very disappointed that the state hasn’t handled this correctly,” Lutton said. “It’s been very frustrating.”

He said he’s been trying since October to arrange for delivery of the vaccine.

“When they said health care workers would be first, we were already delayed from the first shipment,” he said. “I have to believe the vaccines are out there. They’re just not getting to us.”

Rachel Kostelac, a spokesperson for the state Department of Health, said the state turned over distribution to the federal government and opted into the federal government’s Federal Pharmacy Partnership through Operation Warp Speed. The federal government contracted with CVS and Walgreens to administer the vaccines nationwide to long-term care facilities. The logistics of the operation is not in the hands of the state.

Because the federal government is handling distribution through the pharmacy partnership, “the commonwealth is not covering the cost of vaccine distribution for any of the sites, federal program or hospitals/health care systems,” she said. “Vaccines are shipped directly by Operation Warp Speed from manufacturers directly to all vaccine providers.”

Kostelac said long-term care facilities did not have to participate in the program involving CVS and Walgreens, but could have opted out. As long as they had the proper refrigeration, they could have administered the vaccine themselves.

“In fact, 89 out of the 629 skilled nursing homes in Pennsylvania have opted out of the federal program,” she said. “The department has worked with them to ensure they have proper access to the vaccine through other vaccine administration partnerships.”

Something went wrong. Both facilities said they had leased refrigerators that could produce the cold temperatures needed for the Pfizer vaccine and procured an agreement to get dry ice, but faced nothing but roadblocks.

“It’s a real mystery,” Lutton said.

“We could have administered it in a day,” Silliman said.

Kostelac said she knows long-term care facilities are anxious to get the vaccine, but the supply is low compared to the demand for it.

“Operation Warp Speed was responsible for these logistics,” she said. “There is a large discrepancy between supply and demand of the COVID-19 vaccine. Production of the vaccine from the manufacturers is not able to meet the supply for all individuals to be vaccinated at this time. All Pennsylvanians whom wish to be vaccinated will have access to the vaccine.”

Time isn’t something that Silliman feels her residents can squander.

“It’s just very sad to me because we were promised that our vulnerable residents would be the first to get vaccinated,” she said.

Silliman thinks if her residents had been given the vaccine three weeks ago, they could have been spared some suffering.

“I would have given anything to get that vaccine,” she said.

There haven’t been any deaths due to COVID-19 in that period, but there has been illness and much loneliness. She sees it. Her staff sees it and they try to help, but they can’t replace family.

“They see the loneliness every day,” she said. “Video chats help, but they’re not the same as someone being able to hug their loved one.”

There is a light at the end of the tunnel and maybe, just maybe, the residents will be able to see their families again in a couple months.

Hometown was scheduled to receive the first vaccine on Friday, but a date for the second vaccine clinic hasn’t been scheduled yet. Most of the residents and staff opted to get it, Silliman said. Other third-party providers, who are in the center regularly, were also given the option to get vaccinated.

Andrew Benson, a spokesperson for Guardian Healthcare that locally operates Brookmont Healthcare and Rehabilitation Center in Effort and Weatherwood Healthcare and Rehabilitation Center in Weatherly, said they were getting the vaccine this week. Brookmont was scheduled to receive it on Monday and Weatherwood on Wednesday.

“We continue to follow all CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), CMS (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services), and DOH guidance for health care facilities,” he said.

Lutton is disappointed that Pleasant Valley Manor will not be receiving the first round of the vaccine until Jan. 21. He halted admissions in December in order to reduce the risk of the virus being brought into the nursing home and he’s hoping no one gets sick before they have a chance to get the vaccine.

When it does arrive via Walgreens, the majority of the 90 residents have decided to get the vaccine. For residents who declined it, Lutton said they told the families who could then weigh in on it. For residents who could not make the decision for themselves, their families were asked.

He plans to have all of the residents who wanted to be vaccinated to receive it in the first clinic, as well as half the staff and third-party providers. The staff had the option to decline the vaccine. The second clinic to administer the first dose to the rest of the staff and the second dose to everyone else will be on Feb. 11. A third clinic will be on March 4 to administer the second dose to the second group.

Lutton said he doesn’t know how he will get the vaccine to any new residents or staff or staff that declined it initially, because he was told these three clinics were it.

“Declining initially could mean you won’t get the vaccine until it’s readily available,” he said. “We will certainly try to get it.”