The vaccination update can be watched live in the video player above.
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and the city's top doctor will deliver an update on the city's coronavirus vaccination plan on Monday, according to Lightfoot's public schedule.
Lightfoot and Chicago Department of Public Health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady will give the update during a news conference at 2 p.m. Monday at the Esperanza Health Center, located at 4700 S. California Ave., per the mayor's office.
Arwady announced last week that Phase 1A of COVID-19 vaccinations could last through part of February.
During a coronavirus briefing, she said the initial groups will likely take through mid-February to vaccinate. Arwady added that, for some, they will only have received the first dose of the two before the city begins vaccinating other populations.
"So while we are in Phase 1A, which again, is December, January, February, the focus is on health care workers and long term care facility residents," Arwady said. "We will be starting to stand up like I mentioned some of these larger points of dispensing, to be able to make sure that all healthcare workers are able to be vaccinated."
Arwady said the city will put up its first mass vaccination site next week, which will allow for health care workers to be more rapidly vaccinated.
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U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams, who visited Illinois Tuesday to examine the state's vaccine rollout, said he hopes to have half the adult population nationwide vaccinated by the end of February.
Based on data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, health care workers and long term care facility residents are in the 1A group, or of the first people to receive the COVID-19 vaccine statewide.
According to the Illinois Department of Public Health website, the following groups of individuals will be prioritized in the initial phases of the vaccine rollout:
- Health care personnel and residents of long term care facilities
- Essential frontline workers, including first responders
- People with high risk medical conditions, as well as adults over 65 years of age
Thus far, Chicago has only vaccinated health care workers, but have sent the vaccine to all 35 hospitals across the city. Arwady said the health department will begin vaccinating at long term care facilities Monday.
