Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar on Wednesday urged states against “micromanaging” their assigned doses of coronavirus vaccines, saying it is better to have the shots removed as soon as possible, even if they have not been able to get all of their health workers out. vaccinate.
“There is no reason states should vaccinate all health care providers before opening vaccinations to older Americans or other particularly vulnerable populations,” Azar told reporters during a newsletter.
“If they are already using the vaccine that has been assigned, ordered, distributed, shipped, and they get it into the arms of the health care providers, that’s great,” he added. “But if for some reason their distribution is difficult and they left the vaccine in freezers, then at least you should open it up to people 70 and older.”
US officials are trying to ramp up the pace of vaccinations after a slower-than-expected initial rollout. The US coronavirus pandemic continues to accelerate, with the nation logging at least 219,200 new Covid-19 cases and at least 2,670 virus-related deaths every day, based on a seven-day average calculated by CNBC using data from Johns Hopkins University.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has provided states with an overview that recommends prioritizing health workers and nursing homes first, but states can distribute the vaccine at their discretion.
Azar said on Wednesday that states that offer some “flexibility” around who gets the first doses is “the best way to get more shots in the arms faster.” “Faster administration can save lives right now, which means we can’t let perfection be the enemy of good,” he said. “Hope is here in the form of vaccines.”
According to the CDC, more than 4.8 million people in the US have received their first dose of a coronavirus vaccine as of Tuesday at 9 p.m. ET. The number is a long way from the federal government’s goal of vaccinating 20 million Americans by the end of 2020 and 50 million Americans by the end of this month.
US officials acknowledged that vaccine distribution has been slower than they hoped. Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, told STAT News on Tuesday that she expects the introduction of the vaccine to accelerate “quite massively” in the coming weeks.
“It’s the early stages of a very complicated task, but one that we face,” she told STAT.
Global health experts had said that distributing the vaccines to about 331 million Americans could turn out to be much more complicated and chaotic in a matter of months than initially thought. In addition to producing adequate doses, states and territories also require adequate needles, syringes, and bottles to complete vaccinations.
The logistics of getting and administering the vaccine is complex and requires special training. For example, Pfizer’s vaccine requires a storage temperature of minus 94 degrees Fahrenheit. Both Pfizer and Moderna vaccines cannot be refrozen and must be administered at room temperature and within a few hours, otherwise there is a risk of spoiling.
Read more: The Long Journey of the Covid Vaccine: How Doses From the Factory Get Into Your Arm
Azar also said the holiday likely played a role in the slow introduction of the vaccines, saying health care providers knew it would be difficult to line millions of people for vaccinations until December.
Nearly 20 million doses of vaccine have been delivered to more than 13,000 sites across the country, Army General Gustave Perna, who oversees logistics for President Donald Trump’s Operation Warp Speed vaccine program, said during the same briefing.
Vaccine distribution is going “very well,” he said, adding officials are still working to improve the process. “Our goal is to maintain the steady drum beat so states have a cadence of allocation planning and then proper distribution to the right places as designated.”
“We are always re-evaluating the numbers to make sure the distribution is in the right places [and] make sure that implementation takes place so that other decisions can be made about allocations, ”he added.