Vials labeled “COVID-19 Coronavirus Vaccine” and syringe are shown in front of the Johnson & Johnson logo shown in this image taken on February 9, 2021.
Given Ruvic | Reuters
Johnson & Johnson will cut shipments of its single-dose Covid-19 vaccine by 86% next week as it grapples with manufacturing issues at a major Baltimore facility.
According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the government allocated just 700,000 J&J admissions to states next week, up from 4.9 million the week before.
J&J is awaiting regulatory approval for a Baltimore facility operated by Emergent BioSolutions Inc, and is working with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to obtain authorization.
Workers at the Baltimore plant a few weeks ago mixed up ingredients for the J&J and AstraZeneca vaccines, resulting in about 15 million wasted J&J doses. Biden’s administration has put J&J in charge of vaccine production at the plant and has halted production of the AstraZeneca vaccine there.
Once authorized, J&J can administer up to eight million doses weekly, Covid-19 White House coordinator Jeff Zients said at a news conference on Friday. And the company remains on track to deliver 100 million doses by the end of May.
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has called on the Biden government to boost vaccines in her state, which is struggling with the worst outbreak in the country. Michigan is expected to receive 17,500 J&J doses next week, down 88% from the previous week.
The government said it will continue to allocate shots based on population and does not intend to increase doses to more severely affected states as it cannot predict where infections could increase next.
“There are tens of millions of people across the country in every state and province who have not yet been vaccinated,” Zients said Friday. “And the fair and equitable way to distribute the vaccine is based on the adult population by state, tribe and territory. That’s how it’s done, and we will continue to do so.”
“The virus is unpredictable. We don’t know where the next increase in the number of cases could occur,” he added.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said in a statement Friday that the state will receive only 34,900 doses, down 88% from the week before.
“As has been the case since the beginning of our vaccination effort, the X factor is delivery, delivery, delivery, and like any other state, our allocation of Johnson & Johnson doses will be significantly lower next week,” said Cuomo.
California will see its J&J allotment drop from 572,700 to 67,600; Florida from 313,200 to 37,000; and Texas from 392,100 to 46,300.
Some states have also temporarily halted J&J vaccinations at certain facilities after people experienced side effects. The Georgia Department of Public Health stopped all admissions at one location after eight people experienced reactions, and other locations in North Carolina and Colorado also stopped administering doses due to reactions.
However, the CDC said it found no safety concerns or cause for concern related to the J&J doses, according to a statement from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services. The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment also said there is “no cause for concern.”
“After looking at each patient’s symptoms, analyzing other vaccinations from the same lot of the vaccine, and speaking with the CDC to confirm our findings, we are confident there is no cause for concern,” says Dr. officer, said in a statement.
The J&J vaccine was the third vaccine approved in the US after vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna. Friday night, the company delivered nearly 15 million doses in the US, according to data from CDC.
The US administers an average of 3 million vaccine doses every day over seven days. According to the CDC, one in five Americans is now fully vaccinated.
The number of new Covid cases and deaths in the US has fallen dramatically from the winter peak when hundreds of thousands of new infections and thousands of deaths were reported daily.
According to data from Johns Hopkins University, the seven-day average of new cases in the US was 67,000 on Saturday. That’s comparable to the wave that swept the nation last summer. The US reports an average of 982 deaths per day.
New infections are on the rise in 23 states as the more contagious variant first identified in the UK has become the dominant strain in the U.S. President Joe Biden has called on states to open vaccination appointments for all adults by April 19, as the nation is racing to immunize as many people as possible possibly as the virus mutates.