U.S. Rep. Rodney Davis on Tuesday continued to stress the importance of vaccinations as a means to fully reopen the state. The Taylorville Republican toured the vaccination site at Grossinger Motors Arena in Bloomington.
“We’re going to have to make sure that people get vaccinated so policymakers, like me and others at all levels of government are able to make the best decisions to reopen and get back to where we were a year ago,” he said.
“Now that we’ve been able to look back a year, we see what this disease is about,” Davis said. “We’ve been able to get statistics on the prevalence of spread in groups, in schools … businesses and other communities.” Government leaders should use that data to craft new policy solutions, he said.
Asked by The Pantagraph what his opinion was of the state’s current plan to reopen, Davis said, “I think the governor knows my thoughts. My thoughts are that we should be moving ahead based on the data.”
While Davis said an “exponential” increase in the availability of vaccine should be expected, supply in McLean County continues to be blamed for the lag in the percentage of people fully vaccinated.
Roughly 23,406 people have received both doses, around 13.4{066dbc63777e5ed549f406789d72fdeebd77a32711d57f7b38ff2b35c4ba2a42} of the county’s overall population; 69,534 doses have been given out as of early Tuesday.