Paramedic says they need vaccines ‘ASAP,’ not April 2021

A paramedic is raising concern about the timeline given to her profession for the COVID-19 vaccine. As Taylor Braat reports, she says they’re in constant contact with the virus.

CALGARY (CityNews) – A tweet from an Alberta paramedic went viral last week as she called on the government to move paramedics further up the line for COVID-19 immunizations.

She said they’ve been given a tentative date for April 2021, but it should be sooner due to the constant interactions they have with people who have the virus.

Arthur Schafer, a bioethics professor from the University of Manitoba, said the paramedic has a valid point.

“It may be that – the extra protection that you get will also help to protect the patients with which you deal and that is why they should get higher priority.”

In her tweets, @Jessicrap details the high-risk situations paramedics experience, increasingly so, in the times of a pandemic as they attend facilities with outbreaks, and spend time with COVID-positive patients in ambulances, as well as deal with symptomatic patients not wearing masks.

In Alberta, critical health care and long-term care workers, and those living in long term care homes are getting the vaccine first. Other frontline workers, including emergency responders, are in the next grouping, set for spring.

“It will take time to get enough vaccine to offer to everyone who wants it,” said Chief Medical Officer of Health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw. “Please be patient while we all wait for our turn.”

Schafer agrees that any frontline worker has a case to be of high priority, as they deal with vulnerable people or vulnerable situations, but he brings into focus an important issue- that there is a lack of research right now about whether or not those who get the vaccine can still spread COVID-19.

“We don’t know that people who’ve had the vaccine won’t remain infectious. We know from the trials that have been published, that you’ll be protected 95% if you get the vaccine either from being infected or having a serious infection but they haven’t yet checked to see whether your protection means that you cant also pass it along to someone else. So any healthcare worker… who is interacting with patients is still going to have to take complete precautions.”

Jess is not the first person to raise the alarm about paramedics not being included in the first group of people to get immunized – that even as their counterparts in New Brunswick- start getting their vaccinations.

Hinshaw said timelines could shift as vaccines are licensed and more become available.

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