J&J'S 1-SHOT VAXES ON WAY
164K doses bound for NY
Johnson & Johnson’s newly approved single-shot vaccine could be shipped out to states as early as Monday, with more than 164,000 doses allocated for New York in the first round of deliveries.
The Empire State is on course to get 164,800 doses of the vaccine this week, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
As part of the shipment, New York City would receive 71,100 of the shots, the agency said.
Johnson & Johnson has said it has 4 million doses of its vaccine ready to ship immediately after getting federal approval.
The Food and Drug Administration granted emergency authorization on Saturday for the inoculation, which will be the first one-dose COVID-19 vaccine available in the US.
The single dose was found to be 85 percent protective against the most severe cases of COVID-19 in a massive global study.
The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices on Sunday approved guidance to allow the vaccine to be administered to people age 18 and older — the final clearance before a rollout.
The shot will join the country’s arsenal in fighting the pandemic. The two-dose vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer are currently being used.
Both Pfizer and Moderna said they would be dramatically ramping up production of their own vaccines in the weeks to come.
The developments come as the number of shots making their way into Americans’ arms is continuing to rise — with a high of 2.4 million immunizations administered on Saturday alone, according to Bloomberg’s vaccine tracker.
The one-day record is a steep increase from the week’s daily average of 1.65 million doses per day.
Seventy-three million Americans have now received at least one dose of a vaccine.
Drug executives told Congress last week that dose production is expected to double and possibly triple in March.
In New York, 13 percent of the state’s population has gotten at least one shot, and 7 percent are fully inoculated.
Gov. Cuomo said on Sunday that the state had already used up 89 percent of its supply of the first doses of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines.
“Our widespread and expanding network of distribution sites is getting more and more shots in arms across the state, but we’re limited by the supply of available vaccines,” Cuomo said in a statement, echoing what state and local officials have been complaining about for weeks.
President Biden has pledged that a vaccine will be available for every American who wants one “by the end of July.”