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accessHealthNews.net
Fall Special Edition 2021
Volume 8 | Issue No. 49
M
ore than 80 million Americans
remain unvaccinated against
COVID-19 as hospitals reach
capacity and death tolls rise. The
Delta variant is slated to be more
than two times as infectious as
previous strains, with a viral load
(a measure of the density of viral
particles in the body) of at least 1000
times higher than other variants,
according to some reports. The
Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention (CDC) described Delta
as more transmissible than the
common cold and flu – as well as
the viruses that cause smallpox,
MERS, SARS, and Ebola – and called
it as contagious as chickenpox. This
determination comes from a CDC
internal document obtained by and
reported on in a recent New York
Times article.
If that's not enough, the young
and unvaccinated are among
the patients landing in hospital
ICUs – many of whom are in their
20s and 30s. According to a recent
NPR article, 94,000 child cases of
COVID-19 were reported in early
August, a 31% increase compared
with just one week earlier.
HOPE DEFERRED
These optics are far different than
early 2020, when most severely ill
COVID-19 patients in ICU beds were
older adults. During the recent Get
Link'd 2021 Missouri Rural Health
Association Conference, Richard
Logan, Pharm. D. – ESPhA, talked
about COVID-19 vaccine efforts in
Southeast Missouri – an area that
is flagrantly vaccine hesitant. Dr.
Logan, along with his son Tripp, own
and operate three independent
pharmacies in Mississippi County,
which sits on the far Southeast corner
of Missouri. Charleston, Missouri is Dr.
Logan's lifelong home. It's also where
his L&S Pharmacy is headquartered,
and is 20 miles from the closest
hospital. Charleston and neighboring
East Prairie are the only two cities in
the county with clinics, pharmacies,
and the county health department.
"Like most of rural Missouri, this area
of the state is highly agricultural.
The demographics include some of
the poorest in the state," he said.
"We have the poorest folks, with the
poorest health literacy. We say we
are 'the land of fried chicken, fried
catfish, and sweet tea.'"
When the pandemic first took shape
in the U.S., Dr. Logan recalled how
it hit both coasts as ICU beds filled.
"From the safety of rural Missouri, we
watched mobile hospitals begin to
popup, and we watched people
get sicker and sicker and sicker from
COVID-19… We watched hospitals
on both coasts call in refrigerated
trucks to act as makeshift morgues."
The pandemic eventually made its
way to middle America, hitting St.
Louis, Kansas City and Springfield,
Missouri.
Pharmacies closed their lobbies
and went to curbside service, and
physicians' offices transitioned from
office visits to telehealth. Realizing this
meant patients would fall through
the cracks, Dr. Logan and his team
of community health workers (CHWs)
launched outreach efforts to find out
who needed medication, and who
needed access to a physician.
He also brought potentially infected
individuals to the pharmacy and
performed rapid COVID testing.
This hit home, literally. "My wife and
I were driving, and she said to me,
'What if you get this virus, and what if
you bring it home to me?'"
• Visit vaccines.gov (English) or
vacunas.gov (Spanish) to search and find
a vaccine nearby.
• Text GETVAX (438829) for English or
VACUNA (822862) for Spanish to receive
3 vaccine sites.
• National COVID-19 Vaccination
Assistance Hotline 1-800-232-0233. (TTY
line 1-888-720-7489.)
Find a Vaccine Near You
"And then we began to see the trickle of patients at our local
hospital in Scott County and in Sikeston reach capacity," Dr.
Logan said. "We realized it was here, it was among us, and
we had to do something."
