Annandale Healthcare Center staff and residents get COVID vaccines

Fairfax County Fire Chief John Butler gets a COVID vaccine. [FCFRD]

Residents and staff at the Annandale Healthcare Center received COVID-19 vaccines Dec. 30 and 31 from CVS pharmacists. 

Everyone who wanted a vaccination got it, says AHC Executive Director Marie Nadora. Afterward, “everybody seemed to be okay.” 

The pharmacists brought trays of Pfizer vaccines and administered them in residents’ rooms. The second dose will be administered Jan. 19 and 20. 

“Angela,” the AHC resident who has reported on the unhealthy conditions at the AHC during the past few months, said she didn’t even feel the shot in the arm. “A shot of novocaine or giving blood hurt more. It was very quick.” 

Related story: Fairfax County Health Department to begin COVID vaccine rollout

Neither Angela nor her roommate had any side effects after the vaccination, although some people said their arms were staff and had headaches and felt dizzy. Angela says she followed the instructions to do 15 minutes of slow motions of the arm and then rest for half an hour. 

“There’s no reason people should be scared of this thing,” she says.

Some residents and staff members who turned down the vaccination now want it but can’t get it, she reports. 

More COVID cases 

When AHC residents and staff were tested for COVID on Dec. 22, five employees and one resident were positive, according to a robocall from the facility. Staff who tested positive were sent home. 

Whether restrictions imposed on AHC will be eased after the second dose will depend on Fairfax County’s positivity rate, Nadora says. That rate is now 17.4 percent. 

If the positivity rate is less than 5 percent, visitors will be allowed and COVID testing will be done once a month, she says. If it’s between 5 and 10 percent, visitors will continue to be banned and testing will be done once a week. If the positivity rate is over 10 percent, testing will be done twice a week. 

AHC will wait on guidance from health officials to determine whether group activities for residents can resume. 

Related story: Laws protecting nursing homes from COVID-related liability needn’t stop suits against Annandale Healthcare Center

Hospital employees were the first to receive COVID vaccines in Fairfax County earlier this month. The Fairfax County Health Department subsequently began offering vaccinations to healthcare workers not affiliated with a hospital. The vaccination program at nursing homes is coordinate by the federal partnership with pharmacies.

Emergency medical technicians with the Fire and Rescue Department were vaccinated Dec. 27. Health Department frontline workers and healthcare workers with the Community Services Board and Correctional Services are getting vaccinated this week. 

A total of 7,008 vaccines have been administered in Fairfax County as of Dec. 31, according to the Virginia Department of Health’s vaccine dashboard. Statewide, 64,882 people have been vaccinated. 

Fairfax County has the largest number of vaccinations so far in Virginia, says Health Department spokesperson Colin Brody. People who live in the county and work elsewhere are counted in Fairfax County’s vaccination data. 

County vaccinates healthcare workers

When and how Virginia moves into phase 1B of its vaccination program hasn’t been determined yet, Brody says. 1B includes people 75 and older who don’t live in a nursing home and essential frontline workers. 

“It’s hard to say when the state will move into phase IB. There are so many unknowns,” Brody says. “Hopefully that could happen in late winter or early spring” but depends on how many doses are available and how many healthcare workers in phase 1A want to be vaccinated. 

The whole state is moving from one phase to the next together, and the Virginia Department of Health will issue guidelines on how that will happen. 

When the state does move into 1B, people who qualify will be able to go to their doctor’s office, pharmacy, or public health center to get vaccinated.