Los Angeles County explores schools as vaccine sites
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted on Tuesday to consider using schools as "potential sites for mass vaccination" on the heels of news about an effective coronavirus vaccine.
What happened: The board approved a recommendation from Supervisor Janice Hahn, a Democrat, that instructs the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health to work with school districts to explore the feasibility of using their facilities as vaccination sites and report their findings back to the board next month.
"Vaccinating the general public against COVID-19 will be a massive task and it is important to be strategic when selecting vaccine locations when more vaccine is readily available to the public," Hahn's motion states. "Vaccination sites should be trustworthy spaces where residents feel comfortable. Complicating matters further, there may be some lingering fear of receiving the vaccine as the question of safety continues to be a topic of discussion nationwide, instilling doubt and distrust in many. Therefore, it is important that vaccination sites are established as safe hubs for families and children to receive their vaccine doses."
Background: The vote comes after Pfizer announced on Monday that it has created a vaccine that is 90 percent effective, sparking hope for school reopenings and a step closer to national normalcy.
Los Angeles County has more than 2,000 schools and is home to 1.4 million K-12 students, including Los Angeles Unified, the second largest school district in the country.
Los Angeles Unified Superintendent Austin Beutner voiced support for the idea on Tuesday.
"The best way to provide much-needed health services to children is at schools, where they are almost every day," Beutner said in a statement. "It wasn’t that long ago, in 1954, when the first children received a vaccine for polio at Arsenal Elementary School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania."
Some school districts elsewhere in Los Angeles County have welcomed back younger grades with precautions in place but LAUSD has no plans of welcoming students back to normal classrooms any time soon. LAUSD joined other big California districts last month in demanding specific statewide reopening standards from Gov. Gavin Newsom, including regular coronavirus testing for students and teachers at no cost to districts.
While the state has released guidance including mask and social distancing requirements, reopening decisions remain up to local districts as long as Covid-19 rates are low enough.
What's next: In 30 days, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors will receive a report detailing how schools can act as vaccination sites. Tuesday's decision could spark other parts of the state and country to consider the role schools could or should play in administering vaccines to communities.
