Currently, more than 3 million people are fully vaccinated in Illinois

More than 3 million people in Illinois (nearly one in four) have been fully vaccinated with COVID-19, state health officials reported Wednesday.

An additional 138,538 vaccines on Tuesday, despite the suspension of Johnson & Johnson single-dose vaccine use for a federal investigation of blood clots in at least 6 vaccinated U.S. women. Administration was performed. Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines are much more widely used in Illinois.

Illinois Public Health Service officials also announced on Wednesday an additional 31 deaths from COVID-19 and 3,536 new cases of respiratory illness.

Hospitals throughout the state treat 2,076 COVID-19 patients, of whom 453 are in the intensive care unit.

Nevertheless, the state’s average seven-day average number of new cases declined on Wednesday for the first time since March 31st. The state has recorded an average of 3,354 new cases per day over the past week. On Tuesday, the state increased an average of 36 cases a day.

“The number of cases and hospitalizations has increased, but the increase may have slowed recently,” Pritzker said during his appearance in Chicago. “I don’t want to predict this virus because it’s so unpredictable, but in the short term it seems good news.”

Pritzker, who was vaccinated with Johnson & Johnson 20 days ago, said he felt good.

A meeting of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Immunization Implementation Advisory Board met Wednesday to discuss rare intracranial thrombosis in at least six women under the age of 50 who had been vaccinated with Johnson & Johnson a few weeks ago. One of the women has died. The other three are hospitalized.

Johnson & Johnson officials said Wednesday that a seventh case was under investigation.

“The first thing they should do when ACIP meets is to look at all these cases and all the data and make a decision. Do you think they have very rare side effects?” Northwestern Dr. Michael Bauer, Medical Director of Lake Forest Hospital, said.

Finally, committee members cited the need for additional data and information before deciding whether to lift the suspension. The Commission is expected to meet again in a week to 10 days to make recommendations on future use of the vaccine. By then, medical outcomes and side effects from more samples of patients receiving the Johnson & Johnson vaccine will be known and documented.

Coagulation problems were reported by European and Australian health authorities using a similar type of vaccine manufactured by AstraZeneca a few weeks ago. Authorities in some countries have allowed limited use of the vaccine in older people who have no side effects. However, Danish authorities have recently decided to discontinue administration of that particular vaccine. AstraZeneca vaccine is not approved for use in the United States.

More than 7.2 million people in the United States are vaccinated with Johnson & Johnson, according to CDC data.

According to Bauer, one of the reasons regulators have suspended the use of vaccines is to “educate all doctors, emergency rooms, and the people there” to notice severely responsive symptoms. was.

According to the CDC, these symptoms include severe headaches, abdominal or lower extremity pain, and shortness of breath within 3 weeks of Johnson & Johnson’s firing. According to the CDC, these specific blood clots require alternative treatments to replace common anticoagulants such as heparin, which can be dangerous if the wrong drug is used. ..

Some suburban mass vaccination sites were closed on Tuesday due to stock of Johnson & Johnson vaccines, but reopened on Wednesday after supplementation with the other two vaccines.

IDPH records show that 3,028,415 people have been fully vaccinated throughout the state, with a total of 7,482,650 vaccinations since mid-December.

COVID-19 has killed 21,570 people in the state and has infected 1,288,934 people (1 in 10 Illinois) since the outbreak began.

The state’s average 7-day case positive rate is 4.2%. The case positive rate is the percentage of new cases diagnosed from the latest batch of COVID-19 tests. The 7-day average is used to smooth out anomalies in daily reports for these numbers.

• Daily Herald staff writer Marni Pike contributed to this report.