Vaccine doses in county hit snag

US storms slow delivery; new appointments on hold

Marin public health officials have stopped scheduling new COVID-19 vaccination appointments for now after severe winter storms in the Midwest disrupted delivery of the Moderna vaccine.

Some first- and second-dose appointments set up for Thursday and Friday were rescheduled as well, after a shipment failed to arrive due to storm-related delays. Local Rite Aid and Safeway pharmacies also have also been affected by vaccine shipment interruptions.

The county was expecting to receive some 12,850 doses of Pfizer and Moderna vaccines next week. It now appears that it will receive only 5,859 doses of the Pfizer vaccine.

At a news conference Friday, Andy Slavitt, White House Senior Adviser for COVID-19 Response, said about 6 million doses of the coronavirus vaccines have been held up due to severe weather across much of the central and southern United States, but said that was only a temporary delay.

“We anticipate all backlogged doses will be delivered within the next week,” Slavitt said, “most in the next several days.”

Dr. Lisa Santora, Marin County deputy public health officer, said the county is continuing to receive Pfizer doses because the state re-allocated the doses from other counties.

Santora said the interruption in supply will not prevent the county from moving forward with its plan to launch its first drive-through COVID-19 mass vaccination clinic at the Larkspur ferry terminal on Sunday. Appointments are required and are limited to Marin residents age 65 and older who can show proof of age and residency.

“We’ve already allocated a specific amount of first doses for the drive-through clinic,” Santora said. “In some ways, this represents a full-scale exercise or piloting of the drive-through site so it won’t be at full capacity.”

During its first week of operations, the clinic will provide 200 vaccinations per day. As supplies of the vaccine increase, the site is expected to perform up to 1,500 vaccinations per day.

“Providing a vaccination location that is accessible by personal vehicle, paratransit and public transit options is an important factor in removing barriers to the vaccine ensuring health equity for our most vulnerable residents,” Marin County Public Health Officer Matt Willis said in a statement.

Marin public health officials remain uncertain about whether the county will continue to receive its own supply of vaccines from the state.

At the end of January, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced that Blue Shield would be taking over management of the state’s coronavirus vaccination program.

Currently, Marin Public Health receives its own supply of vaccines and from that allotment supplies MarinHealth Medical Center. Kaiser Permanente and Sutter Health, which operate Marin’s other two hospitals, receive their own allotment of vaccines directly from the state because they are large providers.

But which entities receive vaccines and how many doses they receive could change under the new regime.

“In the next week or so, we’re going to be receiving a survey tool from the state and Blue Shield, basically having us provide information around our current vaccine operations,” Santora said. “Then we will meet with Blue Shield in the second or third week of March to review that assessment so Blue Shield can determine how best to continue allocations of vaccines to Marin County.”

Santora said that while Marin County has been successful in quickly getting the vaccine it has received to people, “other counties have been struggling.”

Since the first doses of the vaccines arrived in Marin on Dec. 16, 17% of Marin’s residents, more than 44,000 people, have received at least one shot, in addition to many Marin health care workers who live outside the county.

Even with deliveries getting back up to speed, California continues to be stretched between supply and the demand needed to achieve herd immunity for 40 million people, and by extension the full re-opening of the state.

At least 6.9 million vaccines have been administered to people in California, Newsom said at a Friday news conference in Hayward. That includes 264,000 shots given on Thursday, which stands as the single-highest vaccination day to date.

“We still have more work to do, but the scale and scope and size of the operation we’ve built up … allows for the ability to distribute and administer 2 to 4 million vaccines each and every week,” Newsom said. “The only constraint now is manufactured supply.”

That 4 million figure is the state’s target for weekly vaccinations, and dwarfs the number of vaccines coming in. This past week, 1.38 million vaccine doses were sent to California, and the state is slated to get 1.4 million in the coming week and about 1.5 million in the following week. It was not immediately clear the extent that the shipment delays could affect those projections.

“There is going to be some adjustment, there is going to be some impact,” Newsom said.

Santora said the county is cautiously optimistic Marin may move into the red tier Tuesday. For a county to move from the purple tier to the red tier, it must maintain an adjusted case rate below 7 per 100,000 and a weekly positivity rate of 8% or lower for two consecutive weeks.

During the week ending Feb. 6, Marin had an adjusted case rate of 8.9 per 100,000 and a weekly positivity rate of 2.4%. Santora said since then preliminary data indicates Marin’s numbers have been good enough to qualify it for the red tier. She said the county won’t know for sure until the state evaluates its numbers at the end of this week.

If Marin moves into the red tier, restaurants, retail stores and a number of other venues will be allowed to reopen for indoor service at 25% capacity. Five days after the move to the red tier, Marin’s secondary schools would also be permitted to resume in-class instruction.