The Carson City Board of Supervisors voted Thursday to accept a COVID-19 Health Equity grant from the CDC in the amount of $767,015.77 through June 30, 2024.
The acceptance of this grant will assist in addressing vaccine confidence among underserved populations, according to the agenda item.
Carson City Health and Human Services would like to use the grant to procure a vaccination van, so that they can better serve the community by bringing both information and the vaccine directly to populations.
CCHHS Director Nicki Aaker also spoke to questions from the community, to clear up any misinformation regarding the grant and its usage.
“This is by consent, we do not make individuals get a vaccine,” said Aaker. “Additionally, the technology for the vaccines are not new and have been studied for over 10 years.”
Carson City does not have to to vaccinate a certain amount of the population in order to receive the grant, according to Aaker.
When asked why a vaccination van, which would provide not only COVID-19 vaccines but other vaccines, such as the flu vaccine, as well, would benefit the community, Aaker said going directly to the community has been proven to increase vaccinations.
“We have individuals that trust us,” said Aaker. “They want to come to us for those types of services. We see this with the minority population within our family planning. What we’re seeing with this is if we can go to them and get them the information and give them the opportunities, it works out better.”
Aaker said parents would rather their children get flu vaccines while at schools because of the convenience and the no-cost aspect, and more children will be vaccinated if CCHHS can go to them directly.
Mayor Lori Bagwell asked Aaker to go over screening questions for vaccines, to clear up the misinformation that CCHHS is pushing for every single person to get a vaccine.
“There are times where we do say, ‘Based on your medical history, you should talk to your doctor, we’re not comfortable giving you a vaccine,’” said Aaker.
“We’re not kidnapping people and forcing them to get vaccinated,” said Supervisor Stacey Giomi. “We know there is vaccine hesitancy due to a lack of information.”
Giomi also stated he does believe that going into communities does help, because it helps clear up any incorrect information. Some people still believe there is a cost involved, and by being able to take the vaccine to them, offer information on it and offer the vaccine on site for free that day, will help to get those communities vaccinated.
Aaker also stated that she does not believe incentivizing vaccines is ethical, and CCHHS will not be offering incentives to encourage people to be vaccinated.
Supervisor Maurice White was the only supervisor to vote no on the grant.
“I don’t think it’s appropriate to offer services based one race or ethnicities,” said White. “I understand there are pockets of our community that for their cultural whatevers, their resistance to this, that its simply not appropriate to work on a race-based program.”
White further stated that the grant is a “furtherance of the critical race theory” and he “will not participate in it.”
Mayor Bagwell clarified that everyone in the community can receive a vaccine, and Supervisor Giomi clarified that this grant is for everyone.
“The COVID virus is the opponent,” said Supervisor Lisa Schuette. “The virus and the effects of getting infected, the cost to communities whether its businesses having to shut down or hospitals being full and medical staff being worked to the brink, and other medical issues not being able to be addressed in a timely manner because hospitals are full…there are so many consequences of this virus and over 600,000 people have died. Here the opponent is the virus, it’s not the vaccine, it’s not the mask, its not social distancing; those are just things that mitigate the spread of the virus, and I think it’s really important to keep in mind what the true enemy is. Let’s look out for each other so we can get through this, to keep each other safe, to be able to take off the masks.”
Aaker spoke on the issues the hospital is facing in the community, and stated that the vaccine is not 100 percent, that no vaccine is. But that for those who are hospitalized, the majority are unvaccinated individuals.
“The vaccine is doing what it’s supposed to be doing, keeping individuals out of our medical facilities,” said Aaker. “Last night, our hospital was full, and we had a crisis going on that we were dealing with.”
Aaker stated that there are more people in the community because of the fires, and the medical facilities are being impacted.
“If we can keep these COVID patients out of the hospitals, it helps our hospital systems.”
The agenda item passed 4 – 1 with Supervisor White voting against.
