Extent of COVID-19 vaccine waste remains largely unknown
NASHVILLE, TENN. — As millions continue to wait their turn for the COVID-19 vaccine, small but steady amounts of the precious doses have gone to waste across the country.
It’s a heartbreaking reality that experts acknowledged was always likely to occur. Thousands of shots have been wasted in Tennessee, Florida, Ohio and many other states. The reasons vary from shoddy record-keeping to accidentally trashing hundreds of shots. However, pinning down just how many of the life-saving vials have been tossed remains largely unknown despite assurance from many local officials the number remains low.
To be sure, waste is common in global inoculation campaigns, with millions of doses of flu shots trashed each year. By one World Health Organization estimate, as many as half of vaccines in previous campaigns worldwide have been thrown away because they were mishandled, unclaimed or expired.
By comparison, waste of the COVID-19 vaccine appears to be quite small, though the U.S. government has yet to release numbers shedding insight on its extent. Officials have promised that may change soon as more data is collected from the states.
Ohio’s Departm nt of Health resisted the use of the term “wasted” when asked by The Associated Press for a total number of tossed doses.
eInstead a spokesperson for the agency said that the state tracks “unusable” vaccines reported by state providers.
“With 3.2 million doses administered as of March 9, 2021, the 3,396 unusable doses reported by state providers make up about 0.1% of the doses administered — less than the CDC expectation of 5% of unusable doses,” said Alicia Shoults, an Ohio Department of Health spokesperson.
According to a log sheet provided by the department, Ohio providers reported almost 60 incidents where doses were unused. The largest incident occurred earlier this year, when a pharmacy responsible for distributing the vaccine to nursing homes failed to document storage temperatures for leftover shots, resulting in 890 doses being wasted.
Ohio’s health department reported 2,349 doses wasted or spoiled as of February. Officials stress the wasted amount is extremely low compared to the total doses that ended up in arms.
In Tennessee, wasted, spoiled or unused doses aren’t publicly disclosed on the state’s online COVID-19 vaccine dashboard. However, after nearly 4,500 of Tennessee’s doses were ruined in February, the state’s Department of Health scrambled to find answers.
Florida also doesn’t regularly publish how many doses don’t end up in arms, but a spokesperson for the state health department said 4,435 doses had been reported wasted as of Monday.
In Louisiana, health officials give updated totals of wasted doses to reporters at the governor’s weekly COVID-19 briefing. Out of 1.2 million vaccine doses administered thus far, fewer than 1,500 had been wasted as of last Tuesday, said Dr. Joe Kanter, the governor’s chief public health adviser.