16% of State Fully Vaccinated

More than a quarter of Wisconsin’s population has received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.

As of Friday, more than 1.6 million residents, or 28% of the population, have received at least one dose of vaccine. 16.3% of state residents have completed their vaccination process.

Julie Willems Van Dijk, state Department of Health Services Deputy Secretary, said during a briefing Thursday that vaccinators across the state administered more than 300,000 doses last week. At that time in February the state was doing 200,000 a week.

“We were building the infrastructure and vaccinator network to make this kind of progress possible and now it is paying off,” she said.

When broken down by vaccine brand, approximately 1.4 million doses of Pfizer, 1.2 million doses of Moderna and 51,000 doses of Johnson & Johnson vaccines have been administered.

In the past week, four pharmacy chains have also been added to the Federal Retail Pharmacy Program. Hometown Pharmacies, Managed Health Care Associates, Meijer and Walmart are now receiving a direct supply of vaccine from the federal government to administer. Kroger and Walgreens were the first companies in the program in Wisconsin.

Nearly two weeks ago the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) took over the vaccination site at the Wisconsin Center, 400 W. Wisconsin Ave., opening it up to all state residents and freeing up the City of Milwaukee Health Department’s resources to expand vaccination into neighborhoods.

Since then, the city and Milwaukee County have begun vaccinating residents 16 years or older from 10 ZIP codes prioritized because of their high ranking on the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Social Vulnerability Index.

Residents of these ZIP codes can be vaccinated at two clinics that opened at North Division High School, 1011 W. Center St. and South Division High School, 1515 W. Lapham Blvd. These sites are open 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. from March 22nd to April 19th. The county is also vaccinating residents of these ZIP codes at the Kosciuszko Community Center.

Since these sites opened Monday, 1,384 doses have been administered at the South Division site and 1,069 have been administered at the North Division Site. said Mayor Tom Barrett.

There is still plenty of capacity at these sites to vaccinate more, he said. “If anything we have the capacity and don’t have the demand.”

On Friday, March 19th, the city organized a neighborhood vaccine clinic at Greater New Birth Church, 8237 W. Silver Spring Dr., and administered 800 vaccines, the mayor said.

Northwestern Mutual recently announced that it has partnered with the city to increase vaccinations in the Amani and Metcalfe Park neighborhoods.

It is funding two clinics to provide 7,000 first and second doses. The first clinics will be held Saturday March 27th. In Amani, the clinic will be at COA Youth & Family Centers, 2320 W. Burleigh St. In Metcalfe Park, the clinic will be at the Wisconsin Black Historical Society, 2620 W. Center St.