Jesirae Elzey and Demeatres Ralston, UPS package managers, unload boxes of the COVID-19 vaccine from Moderna when it arrives at UPS Worldport, Louisville, Kentucky, on December 20, 2020.
Michael Clevenger | Swimming pool | Reuters
The distribution of the coronavirus vaccine has been slower than expected by US officials, as the number of vaccinations remains well below the US government’s target of 20 million by the end of the year. federal health officials reported Wednesday.
Just over a million people in the U.S. have received the first dose of coronavirus vaccine as of Wednesday morning, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That’s about 19 million shy doses of previous projections for December and leaves public officials less than two weeks (about 8 days) to try to close that gap.
“Exactly how fast the rise in vaccines, the shots in the arms, is slower than we thought it would be,” the tsar of the president’s coronavirus vaccine told reporters on Wednesday afternoon Donald Trump, Dr. Moncef Slaoui. “And, as I told you earlier, we are here to help states accelerate properly,” he said, adding that the goal of 20 million vaccinations is “unlikely to be met.”
U.S. officials said they are still working on some distribution system issues after some dose deliveries went to the wrong destinations and others came out on the wrong day.
Army General Gustave Perna, who oversees the logistics of Operation Warp Speed, said the U.S. government has done a “good job so far” of distributing millions of doses of Covid vaccine from Pfizer and Moderna to important states, territories and cities of the nation. But he added that U.S. officials are still “learning,” with the daily distribution process “better” and “stronger.”
“We had a handful of packages that we tried to deliver that weren’t destined for the right place, but we caught them before we left them and redirected them to the right place,” Perna told reporters during a press conference Wednesday at the late. “And we had a couple of … shipments that didn’t come out on the right day.”
This is not the first hiccup since distribution began. Perna said last week several thousand doses of Pfizer vaccine traveling to California and Alabama had to be quarantined and returned to the company after the vials somehow got too cold. It is unclear what caused the temperature drop, but Pfizer said in a statement that it was able to intercept shipments and “smoothly supply to deliver them to these customers.”
World health experts had said distributing the vaccines to some 331 million Americans in a matter of months could be much more complicated and more chaotic than originally thought. In addition to making enough doses, states and territories also need enough needles, syringes, and bottles to vaccinate people. People also need to be trained on how to store and administer vaccines. (The Pfizer vaccine requires a storage temperature of less than 94 degrees Fahrenheit).
Despite the wrong steps, CDC Director Robert Redfield on Wednesday praised the US milestone of one million vaccinations, calling it an “achievement,” as vaccine protection will help front-line workers. health while continuing to treat sick patients.
“As we celebrate this historic milestone, we also recognize the challenging path,” he said in a statement. “There is currently a limited supply of COVID-19 vaccine in the US, but supply will increase in the coming weeks and months. The goal is for everyone to be easily vaccinated against COVID-19 as soon as it occurs. sufficient quantities. is available. “
Perna said Wednesday that he expects to improve the distribution of vaccines, and that more than 7,800 deliveries are expected to be completed by the end of Thursday. The United States plans to ship 2.67 million doses of Pfizer vaccine and 2 million doses of Modern vaccine to states next week, Perna said. The government distributed 2 million doses of Pfizer vaccine and 5.9 million doses of Modern vaccine this week. A total of 15.5 million vaccines have been allocated, he said.