Severe weather delays covid vaccine shipments to Pennsylvania
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Weather dealt another blow to vaccine supply in Pennsylvania this week, with state health officials saying Thursday that no Moderna vaccine was shipped Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday, and very little Pfizer vaccine was shipped during that time.
“There will be a significant backlog of orders for distribution as a result of the adverse weather,” said Department of Health Senior Advisor Lindsey Mauldin.
Jasmine Reed, a spokesperson for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said in a statement that shipments of the vaccine would be delayed nationwide.
“Shipping partners are working to deliver vaccine where possible, contingent on local conditions, but the adverse weather is expected to continue to impact shipments out of the FedEx facility in Memphis as well as the UPS facility in Louisville, which serve as vaccine shipping hubs for multiple states,” Reed said a statement reported by NBC News.
Locally, Mauldin said Pennsylvania’s snowy weather this week could mean vaccine that was shipped this week will be delayed in getting to providers.
That news comes a day after Acting Secretary of Health Alison Beam said some vaccine providers in the state had for weeks been using dedicated second-shot Moderna doses as first doses, leading to an influx of requests for second doses that exceeded the state’s entire Moderna allotment for the week.
That misstep, she said, could mean that up to 60,000 second-dose appointments across the state could be pushed back by one to two weeks, though Beam pledged that everyone who received a first dose will get their second dose within the 42-day maximum timeframe recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The mix-up could also affect up to 55,000 first-dose appointments over the next several weeks.
Mauldin urged those with appointments for their first or second dose to check in with their provider before their appointment.
Maggi Barton, a spokesperson for the department, said the delay in shipments should not push any Pennsylvanians past the 42-day mark for their second shot.
Officials said that by pushing second-dose appointments back a week or two, it would take about three weeks to correct the shortage caused by providers giving out second doses as first doses. Barton said that timeframe will hold true even with the delay in shipments because the allotment hasn’t changed.
The back-to-back supply blows come as concern continues to grow over the perceived slow pace of Pennsylvania’s vaccine rollout. As of Thursday, 1.83 million doses of the vaccine had been administered. That’s out of the 2.77 million doses the state has been allocated so far.
A spokesperson for Rite Aid, part of the federal retail pharmacy partnership, said the weather and other supply issues have had a slight impact on vaccine appointments.
“The supply interruption has caused us to reschedule a limited number of appointments this week at select Rite Aid locations,” said Chris Savarese. “We have already contacted affected individuals and their appointments have been automatically rescheduled for the soonest possible date.”
Savarese said if someone has not received a call about rescheduling, then their appointment has not been affected.
The issues haven’t affected pharmacist Alex Micklow because Vandergrift Health Mart Pharmacy – along with its family of pharmacies in Leechburg, Lower Burrell and Bloomfield – haven’t yet been approved to be a providers.
“It’s not affecting us as far as supply, because we still haven’t received anything as far as first doses,” he said, indicating there were some issues with the application to become a provider.
“We just want to get the application done and in place,” he said. “People are still desperate for (the vaccine) – that’s the sad thing.”
There are roughly 4 million residents in the first phase of the state’s vaccination plan, which includes most health care workers, anyone aged 65 or older, residents in long-term care facilities, and people aged 16 to 64 with certain underlying health conditions.
Residents eligible for the vaccine have been left, for the most part, to call and email providers in their area to either set up appointments or join a waiting list.
State lawmakers this week introduced the Vaccine Registry Act, legislation that would require the Department of Health to create a database of residents who are eligible and want the vaccine.
Providers would then be required to use the registry and prioritize those on it when scheduling appointments, according to the legislation, which was introduced by Rep. Ryan Bizzarro, an Erie Democrat. Co-sponsors include Reps. Austin Davis, D-McKeesport, and Pam Snyder, D-Carmichaels.
“Our constituents are frightened, and our providers confused,” Davis said in a statement. “We must create a way to channel the energy and interest in the vaccine into a more functional process and this legislation will accomplish that goal.”
State health officials have maintained that the central issue remains the limited supply of vaccine, not the system in place for making appointments.