Luck struck a man in the aisle of the bakery near the supermarket. Two others worked the night shift at a Subway sandwich shop. Yet another was picked from a list of 15,000 hopefuls.
With millions of Americans waiting for their chance to get the coronavirus vaccine, a lucky few are pushed to the fore as clinics rush to get rid of extra, perishable doses at the end of the day.
It is often a matter of being in the right place at the right time.
Sometimes people who happen to be near a clinic at closing time are offered leftover shots that would otherwise be thrown away. Sometimes health professionals look for recipients. Some places keep waiting lists and randomly draw names. Such opportunities may be increasingly appreciated, as US shortages cause some places to cancel vaccinations.
“One of the nurses said I should go and buy a lottery ticket now,” said Jesse Robinson, outside a clinic in Nashville, Tennessee, this week, where the 22-year-old was selected from a list of 15,000 names for a chance. ‘I’m not going to question it too much. I’m just glad it was me. “
David MacMillan was looking for ingredients for a coconut chickpea dish at a gigantic Washington supermarket when a woman in a lab coat came to him and his friend from the pharmacy in the store.
“I got two doses of the Moderna vaccine. The pharmacy closes in 10 minutes. Do you want them? “MacMillan, 31, remembered the woman who said.” I thought, ‘Let’s go for it.’ “
After MacMillan posted a video of his experience on TikTok, the supermarket chain was inundated for days with phone calls and people hanging out hoping to score a shot.
It has become one of the most unusual quirks in the often uneven, month-long rollout of the COVID-19 vaccines.
Once a vial has been thawed from the freezer and, more importantly, once the seal has been pierced and the first dose has been drawn up, those administering the vaccine are in a race to use it before it goes bad – even if it means taking injections should give to those who do not fit in the priority list.
While it may be troubling to see a 20-year-old getting an injection while a 90-year-old woman in a nursing home is still waiting, public health experts say it’s better to get a dose into someone’s arm, into someone’s arm than throw it away. .
“As far as I’m concerned, vaccinate everyone except the dog,” said Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease expert at Vanderbilt University.
In New York City, a rumor that the Brooklyn Army Terminal had been given extra doses caused a rush to the vaccine distribution site, leading to bumper-bumper traffic in the streets and a line of hundreds on the sidewalks until police came out to say that they had been. duped.
Mike Schotte, 53, and his 72-year-old mother began showing up at pharmacies near their Hurst, Texas home, hoping to get a leftover injection. Eventually, they put their name on a waiting list and got a call that shots might be available if they arrived within half an hour.
“We didn’t have to speed up, but it was pretty close,” said Schotte. “I’m excited to have it.”
Nashville started its lottery system to avoid more haphazard ways of distributing leftover photos. In one case last month, the city’s health department ended up giving extra doses to two employees at a Subway restaurant in a nearby hospital so they wouldn’t go to waste.
Vaccine clinics expect up to a few doses left on any given day. Providers also note that the likelihood of leftover injections becoming available to the wider public is decreasing by each week as suitability for the vaccine grows greater than the very old nursing home residents and primary care workers.
Waste is common in global vaccination campaigns, throwing out millions of doses of flu shots every year. The World Health Organization estimates that more than half of all vaccines are thrown away because they have been misused, unclaimed, or expired. The rollout of the coronavirus seems to have weathered the trend.
While no federal data is available, health authorities in several jurisdictions contacted by The Associated Press reported very little wastage, aside from a few notable cases of doses that were accidentally or intentionally spoiled.
In Cook County in Chicago, Illinois, the health department reported that only three of 87,750 doses were wasted, each of which was accidentally spilled by staff. In Ohio, officials said 165 of the 459,000 doses dispensed last week were damaged or lost in transit, thrown away due to no vaccinations, or otherwise wasted. New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Houston and other cities and states have all reported small fractions of waste in the same way.
“It’s like gold in Fort Knox,” said Dr. Ramon Tallaj, whose SOMOS medical network administered the vaccine in New York City.
Those who hand out the vaccines choreograph an intricate dance to make sure they are treated properly. Vials of the Pfizer vaccine contain five doses – and sometimes an additional one – and Moderna’s contain 10. And clinics do their best not to open a new container unless a registered recipient is scheduled to be vaccinated.
At a clinic on the Hawaiian island of Kauai, Jill Price said that as the day draws to a close and it looks like there are some doses left, a call will be made the next day to those registered for vaccinations to see if they get in. can come. right away.
“It’s such a precious commodity that no one wants to waste it,” said Price.
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Kristin M. Hall, Associated Press author, contributed from Nashville, Tennessee.