COLUMBUS – Beginning next week, college campuses in Ohio will begin offering vaccinations to any student who wants one.
Gov. Mike DeWine says that is the most efficient way to vaccinate the students by May 1, before they head home for the summer break.
“We also believe that more of the college students will opt to get that vaccine if they can get it right there and they can get it at the same time as their peers and fellow students who are there on campus,” DeWine said during his Thursday coronavirus briefing.
Single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccines will be offered to students, who DeWine says are “significant carriers of the virus” even though they are less likely to get sick.
Ohio State Wexner Medical Center will begin scheduling appointments on April 9 for its clinics, scheduled for April 14-20.
Ohio University will host vaccination clinics beginning next Wednesday at Heritage Hall on the Athens campus and each Monday, Wednesday and Friday for the following two weeks.
Businesses will be allowed to open up private clinics beginning April 12 to vaccinate their staff.
The move is a reversal of policy by DeWine, who had told health care providers earlier this week to stop scheduling clinics that aren’t open to the public.
State health officials are worried about an uptick in COVID-19 cases, primarily due to the spread of variant strains of the coronavirus.
Michigan and New Jersey are is currently experiencing an increase in cases that is being blamed on the U.K. and California variants.
Michigan is reporting a rise in cases that is more than 3.5 times what Ohio is seeing, DeWine said.
On Thursday, the state reported that there were 200 more people hospitalized with COVID-19 than on March 21. Data compiled by the Ohio Department of Health shows case increases in 56 counties over the past week.
Ohio’s statewide average rate was just under 150 cases per 100,000 residents last week but data released Thursday indicates the two-week case rate has now risen to 167.1 per 100,000.
DeWine says that demonstrates the necessity that Ohioans get vaccinated.
“We’re in a battle but we’ve got a pretty big cannon and that cannon is the vaccine,” he said.
To date, nearly 30 percent of Ohioans have received at least one dose of vaccine and over 2 million residents have completed their vaccinations, a little over 17% of the state’s total population.
More than 56 million Americans have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19.
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Ohio Lt. Gov. Jon Husted is standing by his tweet last Friday referring to the coronavirus as the “Wuhan virus,” which prompted Asian-American residents of Upper Arlington, where Husted lives, to write a letter expressing their concerns and their fears for the safety of their children.
Husted says the tweet was to criticize the Chinese government and there is no reason for any acts of violence against Asian-Americans
“My words were directed at what I believe is a probable cover-up by the Chinese government,” he said.
The vicious assault of a 65-year-old woman in NY has heightened levels of outrage over anti-Asian attacks that escalated with the pandemic.
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Ohio’s attorney general has joined his counterparts in 45 states in calling on Twitter, eBay, and Shopify to act immediately to prevent people from selling fraudulent CDC vaccination cards on their platforms.
Cards are given by providers when they administer the vaccine and people who buy fake cards can add their own information so it appears they have been vaccinated when they have not.
Dave Yost says the fake cards slow progress in getting people vaccinated from the virus and violate many state laws.
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The state reported 2,475 additional cases of COVID-19 Thursday as the number of new cases continues to rise. A total of 1,020,041 Ohioans have been diagnosed with the disease since the pandemic began over a year ago.
There were 93 new hospital admissions and 1,039 Ohioans were being treated for COVID-19 in hospitals, bringing the total number of hospitalizations to 53,169. The state says 3.79% of the inpatient capacity is occupied by coronavirus patients.
There are 33,375 active cases and the seven-day positivity rate has risen to 4%.