Los Angeles County will again reserve the majority of its available Covid-19 vaccinations next week to provide second doses to those who are ready to receive them, with county-operated large-scale sites only delivering second doses, health officials said Friday.
“Next week, most appointments at our vaccination centers will still be for second doses,” says Dr. Paul Simon, Chief Science Officer in the County Department of Public Health. “We will only provide second doses on our point of dispending (Mega-POD) sites.” This is after only having given second injections this week, which meant that the province had to reverse the first dose agreements two weeks in a row due to problems with the supply of vaccines.
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County-operated Mega-PODs are located in the Pomona Fairplex, Magic Mountain, the Forum, the County Office of Education in Downey, and Cal State Northridge.
He said the first doses will be available in other locations, primarily health centers, pharmacies “and other providers serving the areas most affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.”
The county receives about 200,000 doses each week, although the actual amount varies greatly, making advance planning of reservations difficult. Stocks were so limited this week that the City of Los Angeles had to close the Dodger Stadium vaccination center and four other city locations over the weekend as supplies were exhausted Thursday afternoon. It is unclear how the ongoing shortage in the county will affect the Dodger Stadium site in the coming week.
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said late on Wednesday that the vaccine had run out as the city’s allotment fell by more than 80% week after week.
“This week we only received 16,000 new doses. That’s about the number of new doses we release every day, ”he said. “That is 90,000 less than the week before. That is unacceptable. “
“In a briefing from our county partners this morning,” the mayor said on Wednesday, “we learned that other cities with smaller populations are getting more doses than our entire county with a larger population. If we look at places with small print, we see that. 50% more doses going to other cities. I don’t want to take any dose from them, but it’s only fair that Los Angeles gets a steady supply to meet our time of need. ”
According to The Fresno Bee, Fresno County’s allocation has doubled this week to 19,000 doses. Last week, the province got 8,000.
So who is in charge of the assignments?
The United States government determines how many doses each state receives each week. The state divides those doses among counties and major health systems. The province would then issue an assignment to the city.
CA uses a formula to estimate how many people in an area are eligible to decide on allocations. But the drop experienced in LA this week – especially when compared to Fresno – doesn’t seem fair given LA has a city of 3 million.
“We share their frustration,” said Dr. Paul Simon from LA County. ‘We are all frustrated. We know we could do a lot more if we got more doses. For example, we now receive about 200,000 doses every week and as we have surveyed all of our suppliers, we are confident we can deliver up to 600,000 doses per week. So we have a much, much greater capacity if we can get the available vaccine. “
Garcetti is pointed out this week that pressure from the state to rapidly expand vaccination sites is drying up a pool of vaccines that are already scarce.
Asked more specifically whether the increasing prevalence of vaccination sites may have contributed to the decline in supply, Garcetti noted, “It’s a little bit of Hunger Games. We’re kind of doing ‘all of the above approach’. I think part of this is that we’ve gone to so many places without the offerings to match that you’ve seen some of the core places … like ours and the county mega sites don’t have that much offerings. “
Indeed, on Thursday, long waits plagued the provincial vaccination site at the Forum in Inglewood, as people showed up without an appointment. A shot seeker reported a three-hour delay.
The District Health Department told City News Service the delays “were due to more than 1,000 people showing up at the site for a second dose but not on an appointment.”
The province did not reject anyone eligible for a second dose. This increased sign-up time for almost half of the people on the site. According to the province, additional personnel were deployed to help manage the delays.
Dr. Simon and County Health Officer, Dr. Muntu Davis, both said increasing stocks will be critical as more people qualify for the admissions – noting that the state announced Friday plans to expand to all people 16 or older next month. with underlying medical conditions or disabilities that make them highly susceptible to death or serious illness from Covid.
Davis acknowledged the generally improving downward trends in day-to-day cases, but emphasized that while the numbers are getting better, they are still high, and that “the risk of encountering someone with COVID-19 who may not know is still very high. is. “
As for vaccines, Simon said the most recent figures show 1,345,949 doses have been administered in the province, of which 1,047,074 are first doses. In total, 13.5% of the county population aged 16 and older has received at least one dose and 3.8% of that population has been fully vaccinated.
City News Service contributed to this report.