Vaccine Distribution and Potential Holiday Spikes

He's chief of Infectious Diseases at north Well Health massive hospital and healthcare system in New York State that has seen so much when it comes to the virus and also was where the first vaccination happened last week. I believe it was the Visor vaccine at the north Well Health System. Dr Farber joining us on the phone from Inhasset, New York. Dr Farber, nice to have you back with us. How are you. I'm well, Thanks for having me. Well, tell me a little bit about the vaccine rollout, how

it's going at your hospital system. It's going well, It's going to take a while. It's a massive effort. Um So far, we have vaccinated a fairly large number of people. I believe it's approaching I don't know, two thousand or so. UM. We're rolling it out to priority groups, nurses on the front line, UM, custodians on the front line, UM, your workers, hospitalists, pulmonary critical care people, people working in the COVID units,

and it's going well. It's just a time consuming process, and then eventually we will roll it out to the general community. Do you say time consuming, what do you mean? Just you mean in terms of the administration of it and keeping track of it, and and just finding the right people to make sure that the the priority people are getting it or what. All of those things gone by appointment only people cannot walk in. There has to

be social distancing. The patients are the people being vaccinated have to be observed fifteen minutes, they have to be observed for thirty minutes if they've had a history of a severe allergic reaction to UH another product. And that all just takes time because and and as you know, this vaccine is very unforgiving. The the Madura vaccine is only good for six hours after it's been thought and the Fiser vaccine for a little bit longer, but has

the horrible freeze chain associated with it. So all of these factors make this totally different than you know, influenza at a at a drug store. Yeah, very different. Um, have you gotten the vaccine? Yes, I have I got last week. And what was your experience in getting it? That was one of the things that we were kind of intrigued listening to Dr Anthony Fauci kind of to talk about the process and how it felt. Well. Quite frankly, I was delighted. I couldn't wait to get the vaccine.

I um can't wait to get the second dose. To me, it's an amazing vaccine. The efficacy is much better than any of us had anticipated. And as you know, living in New York or anywhere in the United States, COVID is all around us, There's no question about it. So vaccine itself was much less painful, and my side effects

were trivial. They left in six hours. I took tail and all I felt a little, you know, malaise, and that's it, right, And if you take a singles vaccine or some other vaccines, you can feel that as well, if not worse. Um. What's interesting is, though we were having kind of internal discussions here around our newstable in

our studio of just this whole idea. This was off air, but just it's kind of staggering how what we've had to endure the last nine ten months because of COVID and yet there are a lot of people and even members of the medical community who are hesitant, especially in the black communities, that are hesitant about taking this vaccine, no question about it. I mean, that's a big problem,

and we need to communicate very well. As I have said before, there are many loud voices against the vaccine and there have not been enough voices pro vaccine UM. But this disease is affecting the African American community in a disproportionate manner. They have more cases, higher mortality UM and many more cool mobidities that make the prognosis worse.

So I think it's essential that we gain their trust and I think we need to reach out to them, and we are in the process of doing that UM at north Well, and I think more and more needs to be done. And you're absolutely right, well what are you doing in terms of of reaching out? And I'm just curious because there is as you know, because of the history that we've seen with the Black communities in the past, UM with syphilis in terms of really being

treated poorly UM by the medical community. So I'm just curious, how is that outreach going. I was talking with the head of more House Medical College yesterday and she said, you know, there are studies out there that show that black individuals and Black Americans want to be treated by black doctors and that that's where they find it, you know,

their comfort level, their efficacy in terms of treatment. So I'm wondering, how is that outreach going and what are you guys doing to to make sure that everybody who needs to get this vaccine really gets it. Well, it just started, and the initiation is with community groups with leaders in the black community. A lot of them are in churches and other community groups. And the concept is, you know, we're starting there, UM. So it's going to take time, but there will be UM an outreach in

those communities. We will make it easy for people in those communities to get vaccinated. Uh. They will be physically near them. There's transportation issues, UM, and and there's a lot of work ahead of us to to do that right right exactly, to to do that outreach. UM. Just got about a minute here and then we'll take a break and come back and talk somewhere. What are you seeing in terms of COVID cases right now? There's a lot of them. Quite frankly, our census is uh slightly

more than a thousand at Northwell Health. Um, that's dramatically higher than it was. It's you know, as close to ten times as high as it was two months ago. It's not as is the whatever number that we hit in March, but it's very alarming and quite frankly, it's it's a huge problem again. So Dr farber Um, I was getting ready for a weekend show, kind of planning for it, and it'll go out, um, you know, between

the holidays. And one of the things I wrote in the introduction was, you know, we've been all predicting this long dark winter, and it's really upon us, isn't it when it comes to the vaccine, and really rather when it comes to the virus. Yeah, there's no question about it. And I think we better double down on on the options, the few options that we have until large segment of the population gets vaccinated, hopefully by the spring. So I

think we should be very careful. It's dangerous out there well and when it comes to you said, you know, you're seeing a lot more cases. You said, I think a thousand at north while still below the peaks that we saw in the springtime, but nonetheless a big jump in cases. What kind of cases are you seeing? Is it younger people, is it more manageable cases? What do we know about kind of what kind of COVID cases

we're seeing at this point? Yeah, I mean, on a positive note, UM, the mortality is much lower than it was in the spring. Um our leape of stay is much lower than it was in the spring, which makes uh, which makes us have more bed capacity. We have not had to shut down our essential services. UM. People are doing better and I think a lot has changed since the spring. We're smarter, UM, more knowledgeable, have better protocols to take care of these patients. That's not to say

that it's a different virus. It is not UM and the patient population is slightly younger than it was in the spring, but not dramatically. Okay, that's interesting, but it's still as lethal correct or has the potential to be. Oh, certainly has the potential to be. Our death rates are much lower than they were in the spring. But yes, it certainly can be lethal in terms of the death rates being lower. Is that because as you said, you know, you guys, we've talked about this a lot on air

with with you and with others. You know, we didn't have a playbook. We didn't have a medical playbook, and so everybody was kind of learning as we were going. But now we have a little bit of a playbook in terms of how to treat patients, how to treat patients differently and look at and look at the cases. Is that fair? Is that why maybe it's not so

lethal lethal or the mortality rate is much lower. Yeah, there's no question that there was a learning curve, not to mention the overwhelming demand and the terrible situation with the need to redeploy so many people UM and so keeping it under control, knowing about better management of the UM of the airway, avoiding the ventilator with high flow oxygen and bypath which we're now doing keenly now, proning

uh DECCA drawn m dissevere uh ane coagulation. All of those things have significantly improved the way UM people are managed, and it's much more protocol driven than it was before. So your understanding of how maybe the next month or so, maybe a couple of months look for us in terms

of k says and dealing with it. And then as your understanding of further rollout and distribution of the vaccine, what are your expectations for maybe what spring and summer or maybe summer is maybe more realistic for us to talk about what it looks like for maybe the New York metro earlier area, maybe for the country overall. Well, I'm hopeful that by the summer things will be dramatically better.

I don't think that we're going to be rid of COVID anytime soon, and I still think people will be We will be wearing masks in the summer, and you know, I don't know what percent of the population will be vaccinated by them, particularly with many people still afraid of the vaccine. So I think it will be dramatically better, but I don't think it's going to be gone. And I think, well, you know, we also have to watch

these mutant viruses. Um This is an unpredictable virus, and I think every time we underestimate it, we get burned. Did the news out of the UK just got about forty seconds left or the variant? Did that scare you a little bit, Yes, quite frankly it does. Anytime this virus mutates, it scares me. I think we'll be able to handle this one. And it certainly doesn't seem to be more virulent. It may be more infectious, and you know,

but you've got to watch these mutants. That vaccine may need to be changed someday, um, hopefully in the distant future, but who knows. Yeah, well, it's just kind of unbelievable. One headline after another. UM, thank you so much. I know your world is busy and crazy and you've been so kind to always find time for us. So thank you so much. Have a safe and healthy holiday season. Dr Bruce Farber his chief of infectious Diseases at North While Health, as I said earlier, a massive hospital and

healthcare system in New York State. They have been dealing with this virus and uh situation from day one here in the New York metro area and kind of continue to do in this next wave. Uh so. Dr Farber joining us from Inhasset, New York,