Coronavirus: Vaccine guidelines for Ohioans with severe medical disorders released

Jan. 19—Starting next week Ohioans with a developmental or intellectual disability and a severe congenital, developmental or early-onset medical disorder will be eligible to be vaccinated against coronavirus.

Gov. Mike DeWine released a list of medical conditions that will qualify individuals for the vaccine, including cerebral palsy, spina bifida, sickle cell anemia, severe lung disease, severe type 1 diabetes and more.

"For those persons with an intellectual or developmental disability and one of these conditions, their local county developmental disabilities board will reach out to them to help coordinate receipt of the vaccination," DeWine said.

Starting Feb. 15, anyone with those medical conditions who does not have an intellectual or developmental disorder will be able to be vaccinated.

Ohio is expected to receive about the same number of coronavirus vaccines for the next few weeks DeWine said.

This week, the state got an estimated 100,000 doses this week.

The governor said the state's next bump in vaccine shipments could come in March when the Johnson and Johnson vaccine is expected to be authorized for use.

This week Ohio is entering Phase 1B of vaccine distribution, with people ages 80 and older eligible to be vaccinated.

Multiple health departments and health care networks in the Miami Valley started vaccinating Ohioans today, with vaccine clinics scheduled to take place throughout the week.

Some providers saw registration for the clinics fill up in hours as vaccines were made eligible to the state's general public for the first time. Previously, Ohio has prioritized frontline health care and hospital staff, EMS and first responders and residents and staff in nursing homes, assisted living facilities and other congregate care facilities.

Under Phase 1B, vaccinations are scheduled to begin for the following: — Jan. 18: Age 80 and above. — Jan. 25: Age 75 and above and Ohioans with severe congenital, developmental or an early-onset medical disorder. — Feb. 1: Age 70 and above and K-12 school staff. — Feb. 8: Age 65 and above

It is not clear if the governor will address a statewide curfew scheduled to end on Saturday. The curfew, which initially started Nov. 19 and was scheduled to last 21 days, has been extended twice.

Less than 5,000 daily cases of coronavirus were reported in Ohio for the second day in a row Tuesday, according to the Ohio Department of Health.

The 4,989 cases recorded were a slight increase from the 4,312 added on Monday. In total, there have been 836,055 cases in Ohio throughout the pandemic.

More than 250 hospitalizations were reported, bringing the state's total to 43,605. Patient counts continued to decline Tuesday, with 3,643 coronavirus patients in Ohio hospitals. It's the lowest number of patients reported in the last two weeks and the seventh day in a row the state had less than 4,000 hospitalized COVID-19 patients.

Southwest Ohio also continued to see a drop in coronavirus patients in hospitals. As of Tuesday, 975 patients were in regional hospitals. It's the first time the patient count was less than 1,000 in at least two weeks.

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