As of April 16, 2021, the Coast Guard has fully vaccinated over 50% of its members, and another 10% are partially vaccinated.
With a workforce of over 57,000 people spread throughout the United States and around the globe, the logistical challenges have not deterred the Coast Guard’s robust and innovative vaccination campaign.
The nerve center of the service’s vaccination operations, which are connected to the Department of Defense COVID-19 vaccination operations, is the Coast Guard COVID-19 Vaccine Incident Command (CVIC). The incident command is a standardized, national approach to emergency and crisis response leadership, an area in which the Coast Guard excels.
Capt. Paul Michaud, U.S. Public Health Service, is the CVIC incident commander. He leads a diverse team of medical professionals, planners, logisticians, and communicators. Michaud is the Chief Pharmacist for the Coast Guard.
“Achieving a 50% vaccination rate, in less than four months, is quite the achievement, but we’re only halfway there. The ultimate goal is vaccinating the total Coast Guard workforce in order to achieve full readiness posture – protecting ourselves, our families, and our shipmates,” Michaud said.
In addition to the daily vaccinations taking place at the health clinics throughout the Coast Guard, outreach efforts have also included airlifting the COVID-19 vaccinations to remote units and coordinating vaccinations aboard underway cutters.
Our service continues with COVID-19 vaccinations – which have been proven to be safe and effective – and strongly promotes all members to become vaccinated as soon as possible.
Although receiving the vaccine is currently voluntary, the desire to get every member fully vaccinated against COVID-19 remains critical to Coast Guard mission readiness, and for the health and well-being of our members and their families, as well as those in the many communities in which we work and live.
Noting the milestone that vaccinating half of the workforce represents, Michaud was quick to add, “Vaccinating the workforce is the number one way we get out of this pandemic and return to some semblance of normalcy.”