L.A. County: More COVID-19 vaccines are flowing in, with first Johnson & Johnson doses to arrive next week
Los Angeles County expects to receive 312,000 vaccine doses next week, including 53,700 doses of the highly anticipated Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which requires only one shot.
Additional doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine were not expected for several weeks.
The allotment next week is the biggest since vaccines began flowing into L.A. County in December. This week, the county
received 269,000 doses. The week prior, it received 211,000 doses in what have been ever-increasing allocations.
L.A County on Friday reported 144 new deaths and 2,110 new cases of the coronavirus, bringing the death toll to 21,910 deaths and 1,200,120 positive virus cases.
Hospitalizations dipped below 1,300 for the first time since Nov. 18. There are now 1,264 people being treated for COVID-19 in local hospitals, with 372 in intensive-care unit beds.
The county’s daily report did not include the latest counts for Pasadena and Long Beach, which maintain their own health departments. One new fatality raised Pasadena’s death toll to 319; 15 new cases raised the city’s case total to 10,977. Long Beach did not update Friday, but as of Thursday had reported 862 deaths and 51,472 cases.
Long Beach announced Friday that starting next week, it will begin vaccinating residents between the ages of 16 and 64 who have physical or developmental disabilities.
The updated schedule for vaccination prioritization will take effect on Monday, and Long Beach will be one of the first jurisdictions in California to begin vaccinating people younger than 65 with disabilities.
Disabled residents can go to the Long Beach Convention Center between 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. every day except Sunday to receive vaccines. No appointment is necessary, but individuals must show documentation of a disability, such as a placard or doctor’s note. They also must provide proof of Long Beach residence, including a utility
bill or a driver’s license.
The city is also working on deploying mobile vaccine clinics outside downtown Long Beach to serve people with disabilities.
“We are grateful to now have the ability to start vaccinating people with disabilities,” Mayor Robert Garcia said. “We are going to immediately prioritize this group for our clinics and home visits when needed.”
Countywide, 62% of the vaccine coming in, or 193,000 doses, will be reserved for those receiving first doses, a welcome sign for the 1.8 million newly eligible recipients this week, including teachers and school staff, child care providers, food and agriculture workers and emergency service personnel.
“It’s becoming increasingly clear that more vaccine is flowing into the county from direct allocations from the state and federal government,” said Dr. Paul Simon, chief science officer at the L.A. County Department of Public Health. “So the numbers I quote for vaccine supplies are in our network. But as the stats this week indicate, there were many more doses being administered from direct channels.”
As of Friday, L.A. County had administered 2,415,460 doses, representing an increase of more than 460,000 from the week prior. The numbers, which put average doses at roughly 65,000 per day, include those vaccines administered at a variety of other sites that receive doses directly from federal and state sources.
A week prior, roughly 40,000 doses per day were being administered.
In addition to the county’s more than 400 vaccination sites, there are vaccines delivered directly to health systems, pharmacies and federally qualified health clinics, officials said.
In some cases, the vaccines go directly to mega-PODs, one run by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, another by Dignity Health System and a third by Kaiser Permanente.
President Joe Biden has set a goal to have all adults who want the vaccine inoculated by May. And L.A. County officials believe they can meet this goal with a current network of providers that have the capacity to administer more than 600,000 doses per week.
At the same time, the county is continuing to see a decline in cases, with fewer than 1,000 new cases on average per day and 1,264 people in the hospital with COVID-19. By Tuesday, the county will likely move into the less restrictive red tier, and two weeks later junior highs and high schools would be permitted to open.
“Fortunately we’ve seen a rapid decline in cases more recently,” Simon said. “However more than 30% of those hospitalized with COVID-19 remain on ICU, many on ventilators. The important point is we cannot let this happen again. We can not scale up vaccinations if we are dealing with another surge. With Biden’s announcement that we should have enough vaccinations by end of May, we are so close.”
Officials also said Friday that L.A. County would forward on March 15 with guidance from the state to open vaccine eligibility to those with pre-existing conditions or disabilities. But questions remained about how those requirements would be verified.
“Ideally, vaccinations for these people could best be done in the provider settings, and then doctors can make the best decision for their patients,” Simon said.