WASHINGTON (AP) – The Trump administration is urging states to speed up the delivery of COVID-19 vaccines to people 65 and older and other people at high risk because they do not withhold the second dose of two-dose vaccines. officials said Tuesday.
Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar said “the state administration has focused too closely.”
As a result, he said, the Trump administration is asking states to vaccinate people 65 and older and under 65 with underlying health conditions that put them at risk. He said vaccine production is such that the second dose of the two-shot vaccine can be released without endangering vaccination for those who received the first vaccine.
“We now believe that our manufacturing is predictable enough to make sure that dose-by-dose dosing is available for people in continuous production,” Azar told ABC’s “Good Morning America.” So now everything is available to our states and our health care providers. “
Each state has its own plan on who should be vaccinated, based on the recommendations of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC recommendations give top priority to health care workers and residential residents.
But the slow pace of vaccine deployment has frustrated many Americans at a time when the number of coronavirus deaths has continued to rise. More than 376,000 people have died, according to the Johns Hopkins database.
Azar said now was the time to move “to the next phase of the vaccine program” and expand the set of eligible people to get the first dose.
This also means expanding the number of places where people can be vaccinated by adding additional community health centers and pharmacies.
“We have already distributed more vaccines than we have health personnel and people in residences,” Azar said. “We need to reach more channels of administration. We have to get it in pharmacies, in community health centers ”.
He said the federal government “will deploy teams to support states that make mass vaccination efforts if they so wish.”
U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams said hundreds of thousands of people are being vaccinated every day across the country, but the pace of inoculations needs to improve.
“We’re in a race against this virus and frankly we’re behind,” Adams told Fox & Friends. “The good news is that 700,000 people are vaccinated every day. We’re going to hit a million people and we have to keep up that pace. “
President-elect Joe Biden is expected to deliver a speech on Thursday outlining his plan to speed up vaccination to more people in the first part of his administration. His transition team has promised to release as many doses of vaccine as possible, instead of continuing the Trump administration’s policy of withholding millions of doses to ensure there will be enough supply to allow those who receive the first vaccine to get it. ne a second.
The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine requires a second shot about three weeks after the first vaccination. Another vaccine, produced by Moderna, requires a second vaccine about four weeks later. Single-shot vaccines are still being tested.