Gov. Asa Hutchinson announced Thursday that he had activated 20 Arkansas National Guard members to help the state Department of Health with its mass coronavirus vaccination clinics and "accelerate our efforts to contain covid-19."
Meanwhile, the downward trend in the state's daily coronavirus case increases resumed Thursday as the count rose by 264.
After rising for the previous three days, the number of people hospitalized with covid-19 fell Thursday by 15, to 245.
The state's death toll from the virus, as tracked by the Health Department, rose by eight, to 5,515.
"Vaccinations are making a huge difference in Arkansas," Hutchinson said in a statement.
"As the number of cases, hospitalizations, and deaths continues to decrease, let's double down on our efforts to get vaccinated if you are in priorities 1-A, 1-B, or 1-C."
Also on Thursday, the Arkansas Supreme Court issued an order reinstating deadlines for people who file lawsuits in circuit and district courts to serve the defendants with copies of the suits.
"Because we are encouraged by the state's recent downward trend in COVID-19 infections and by the increase in vaccinations, we announce the resumption of the deadlines for service of process under Rule 4(i) and Rule 3 -- effective immediately," the court said in the unsigned opinion.
"As a transitional measure," it said, plaintiffs in cases already filed have until May 31 or the normal 120-day deadline, whichever is later, to serve the defendants.
[CORONAVIRUS: Click here for our complete coverage » arkansasonline.com/coronavirus]
State Epidemiologist Jennifer Dillaha said the National Guard members will help with vaccination clinics in the Health Department's northwest, northeast, southwest and southeast regions.
Those include clinics scheduled next week at the department's health units in Marianna, Prescott, West Memphis and Fort Smith.
Each unit has clinics scheduled every day from Tuesday to next Friday.
"Whenever we do a large event, we pull people from our local health units, and sometimes that makes it difficult to do routine clinical care that we provide through our local health units," Dillaha said. "This will assist us and not make it necessary for the discontinuation of that while they do these community vaccination events."
The department is not scheduling as many vaccination clinics in the central region, encompassing Pulaski, Faulkner, Saline, Lonoke, Garland, Perry and Grant counties, because of the number of other providers in the region offering the shots, she said.
Although Hutchinson announced earlier this month that the department would be holding clinics each week in each of the five regions, a list on the Health Department website for the ones scheduled for next week didn't include any in the central region.
[Interactive Arkansas map not showing up above? Click here to see it: arkansasonline.com/arvirus]
In a news release, the guard said it would send each vaccination site a "strike team" consisting of two medics to administer shots and two other guardsmen to help with paperwork and logistics.
The guardsmen are from the 77th Theater Aviation Brigade, 39th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 142nd Field Artillery Brigade, 87th Troop Command and 189th Air Wing.
"The initial deployment of four (4) teams will occur on Mar. 22 with additional teams preparing to deploy at the direction of [the Health Department]," the guard said in the release.
"The Arkansas National Guard is prepared for and capable of expanding up to sixteen (16) strike teams."
A SLOW START
Tuesday's start of Phase 1-C of the state's vaccination plan made the shots available to people 16-64 with health conditions putting them at risk of severe illness from the virus and certain types of "essential workers," including those with jobs in food service, transportation, the media and other industries.
Since Hutchinson announced the move, Michael Butler, who owns several pharmacies around the state, said he's been "fairly inundated" with requests from companies to schedule work-site clinics.
Otherwise, he said. vaccinations have been "slowing up a little bit."
He said he can vaccinate 1,000 to 1,500 people at his mass vaccination clinics, but gave shots to just 600 people at one held Wednesday in Arkadelphia.
On Thursday, a clinic in Hot Springs Village drew about 350 people, and one in Fouke had 60 or 70.
Appointments for Butler's clinics can be scheduled at eastgatepharmacy.com.
Many people who fall under Phase 1-C may have difficulty taking time off work to get vaccinated, Butler said. Others may not know they're eligible.
"They wanted to be eligible four months ago whenever we started the process, and they kept getting told no," Butler said.
"I think now they're just passively waiting for the availability and they just maybe have not realized they were included in that group."
As of Wednesday afternoon, the Health Department was still working on a detailed list of the health conditions and jobs allowing people to get shots.
By Thursday, a six-page document containing the information and dated Wednesday had been posted to the department's website.
To get the vaccines to people with chronic health conditions, Dillaha said, the Health Department added more than 30 medical clinics to the list of providers that will receive doses next week.
"We're expecting the clinics to identify their patients who are eligible and get them in and get them vaccinated as quickly as possible," Dillaha said. "We're not wanting them to wait and hold vaccine until those patients come in for their routine appointments."
DOSES REPORTED
According to the Health Department, providers participating in the vaccination effort coordinated by the state had received 1,360,780 doses as of Thursday morning, up 31,610 from the total a day earlier.
The doses those providers reported having administered, including booster shots, rose by 19,643, to 815,030.
In addition, Walmart, Walgreens, CVS and Community Pharmacy Enhanced Services Network pharmacies had been allotted 194,080 doses through federal programs, up by 19,700 from the total a day earlier.
The doses those businesses reported having administered rose by 2,988, to 87,951.
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of Arkansans who had received at least one vaccine dose rose Thursday by 13,585, to 615,670, representing about 20.4% of the state's population.
The number who had been fully vaccinated rose by 5,396, to 324,554, or about 10.8% of the population.
Among the states and District of Columbia, Arkansas continued to rank 44th in the percentage of residents who had received at least one dose and 46th in the percentage who had been fully vaccinated.
Nationally, 22.7% of people had received one dose, and 12.3% had been fully vaccinated.
FEWER HOSPITALIZED
Thursday's increase in cases was smaller by more than 50 than both the one a day earlier and on the previous Thursday, March 11.
After rising slightly Wednesday, the average number of cases added to the state's tally each day over a rolling seven-day period fell Thursday by almost 11, to 286.
The drop in hospitalized covid-19 patients brought the number down to just above the 243 patients who were hospitalized as of Sunday, which was the lowest level since June 22.
"I would say we are definitely moving in the right direction," Dillaha said.
The number of covid-19 patients who were on ventilators fell by seven, to 47.
The number who were in intensive care fell by nine, to 107.
The cases that were added to the state's tally included 170 that were confirmed through polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, tests.
The other 94 were "probable" cases, which include those identified through less-sensitive antigen tests.
The state's cumulative count of cases rose to 328,045.
That comprised 257,799 confirmed cases and 70,246 probable ones.
The number of cases considered active fell by 74, to 2,734, as more than 300 Arkansans were newly classified as having recovered.
Washington County had the largest number of new cases, 32, followed by Benton County, 31, Pulaski County, 27, Polk County, 22, and Faulkner County, which had 12.
Among prison and jail inmates, the Health Department's count of cases rose by nine.
Department of Corrections spokeswoman Cindy Murphy said the number of cases among inmates rose by six, to 90, at the East Central Arkansas Community Correction Center in West Memphis; by four, to 1,614, at the Ouachita River Unit in Malvern; by three, to 147, at the Northeast Arkansas Community Correction Center in Osceola; and by two, to 165, at the Central Arkansas Community Correction Center in Little Rock.
Of those prisons, the Malvern lockup had the largest number of cases that were active, 29, followed by the Osceola center, which had six.
(Because of differences in timing on reporting and data entry, the Corrections Department's numbers often differ from the Health Department's.)
The state's death toll rose by four, to 4,404, among confirmed cases, and by four, to 1,111, among probable cases.
Among nursing home and assisted-living facility residents, the state's count of virus deaths rose by five, to 2,034.
The number of people who have ever been hospitalized in the state with covid-19 grew by 28, to 15,166.
The number of the state's virus patients who have ever been on a ventilator rose by one, to 1,563.