GREEN COVE SPRINGS – The county is preparing for COVID-19 vaccines as the two most promising vaccines seek Food and Drug Administration approval this month.

Two COVID-19 vaccine suppliers, Moderna and Pfizer, are set to seek FDA approval this month, which means the vaccine could hit the market as early as a few weeks from now. Pfizer is a private vaccine producer ahead of federally-funded Moderna on the vaccine timeline and it’s already manufacturing millions of doses. The vaccine will likely hit distribution within 24 hours of its expected FDA approval. Most in Clay County are likely months away from the vaccine, though.

“[Pfizer] will be distributing within 24 hours,” Clay County Florida Health Department administrator Heather Huffman said. “We have about 220,000 residents and 20 to 50 million doses globally. We don’t know how much will come down to the state, let alone the counties.”

Huffman said the healthcare workers in large hospital systems will receive the first vaccines. Law enforcement, emergency management service workers, utility workers and office-based doctors and nurses will likely receive the second batch of vaccines. She said people will have to provide proof that they belong in the designated category for vaccine distribution at that time. The more vulnerable populations like those 65 years of age and older will be up to bat next with the general population likely gaining access sometime later in 2021.

Huffman said the Moderna vaccine is just a few weeks behind Pfizer so that could change things as there will then be two effective vaccines on the market. She said Moderna will be easier to handle logistically because it requires a simple frozen storage whereas the Pfizer vaccine requires dry ice storage, which is more challenging for health departments.

The three new BCC members, Jim Renninger of District 3, Betsy Condon of District 4 and Kristen Burke of District 5 listened to Huffman’s presentation during their first meeting last week. Huffman also updated the BCC on the county’s COVID-19 numbers.

She said the county is up about 35% going from 381 cases the week of Nov. 10 to 587 cases the following week. There was a large increase in tests performed though over those two weeks going from 3,800 to more than 5,000 from the week of Nov. 10 to the week of Nov. 17. Despite the increase in positive cases, the county’s death rate has kept a steady 2% mortality rate, with 82% of those mortalities coming from those 65 years of age and older.

“Age and underlying health conditions continue to be the most contributing factors,” Huffman said in regards to mortality and hospitalization cases.

In other business, the county has received an additional $7.65 million in CARES Act funding, which is 20% of its total expected allocation of $38,257,783. The additional funding puts the county at the front of the pack in the state for counties with populations less than 500,000.

“Clay County is number one of the 55 counties with 500,000 or below who have been awarded this type of CARES Act money,” Clay County EMS director John Ward said. “The majority of counties are still getting their 20% that we got a couple of months ago, so we are literally the lead of the state.”