Detroit Public Schools Community District Announces Program To Provide COVID-19 Vaccines For Students
(CBS DETROIT) - The Detroit Public Schools Community District announced that in a new partnership, it is the first school district in Detroit to become a childhood immunization provider and the first district to be fully authorized to administer COVID-19 immunizations.
The partnership is with the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, Michigan's Racial Disparities Task Force, and the Detroit Health Department.
Through this new collaboration, school nurses will administer COVID-19 vaccines at schools for students and families who provide consent.
"Detroit has a 4% childhood vaccine rate, 10 times less than other surrounding cities. This creates an increased chance of positive cases and outbreaks. The significance of providing the vaccine directly to our families and students in their schools, will speed up the process of students resuming in-person learning permanently while continuing to implement the highest level of safety precautions," said Dr. Nikolai Vitti, Superintendent, DPSCD.
In order to help the district carry out this initiative, the MDHHS is providing a $100,000 grant to set up mobile vaccine clinics.
"Assisting communities by supporting projects that give families easier access to vaccines in the neighborhoods where people work, live, and go to school is critical to our current COVID-19 response and our path forward," said Elizabeth Hertel, MDHHS director. "MDHHS has helped school districts across the state set up pop-up school vaccination clinics, but Detroit Public Schools Community District is the first school district in the state that has enrolled as an ongoing COVID-19 provider site and establishing immunization clinics in their district."
In addition to this, the MDHHS is also providing families who $25 CVS gift cards to each family with a child who participates in the program.
The first six schools chosen to kick off this program are A.L. Holmes, Coleman A. Young, Earhart, Mumford, Osborn, and Southeastern.
Officials said, "To begin the program the week of Feb. 14, schools will notify parents and families to gain the appropriate consent from the legal parent or guardian, no other family member will be authorized to sign the consent form, this is imperative to ensure the state immunization records are properly recorded."
One of the main goals of the program is to host first and second-dose clinics in every school by the end of this school year, June 30, 2022.
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