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After three weeks of a net of vaccinations in New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio is facing pressure to speed up vaccine delivery immediately, to hundreds of sites, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
The mayor proposed a plan to double the vaccination capacity by the end of the month. And he also wants to see sites 24/7.
Currently, 125 vaccination sites are open and 35 more will open by the end of the weekend, according to city health officials. The city has so far administered a total of 110,241 doses since December 14. Only 135 doses were distributed on New Year’s Day; most were administered on December 23, when 13,988 doses were administered.
“Getting it right in the first few weeks was the pioneer,” the mayor said at a press briefing on Monday. “Now is the time to sprint.”
Eligible healthcare workers can now begin scheduling appointments at two Manhattan locations within the next two weeks. Five sites at Health + Hospitals facilities can begin immunizations on Wednesday for eligible workers. Three sites will open Sunday at high schools in Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx. Sites in community health centers and emergency care facilities are also planned.
The mayor is calling on the state to increase the flexibility of vaccine prioritization, to allow other essential workers as well as New Yorkers aged 75 and over to start getting vaccinated.
“Having this flexibility will allow us to accelerate our efforts,” said de Blasio.
De Blasio said he expects more than 100,000 vaccines to be given this week alone – approximately the same amount of doses given overall over the past three weeks.
The city currently has the capacity to administer 150,000 doses per week. City health officials now hope to reach the capacity of 400,000 injections per week by the end of the month.
City council member Mark Levine, chairman of the health committee, hopes the city goes further than that – immediately.
“It’s a warlike situation,” Levine said in a telephone interview. “And there should be a 24/7 vaccination operation.”
He is working on legislation that would require a city health service vaccination site (called PODS, or distribution points) in every postcode to be open 24/7, activate the city’s medical reserve corps, create a volunteer training system for anyone who wants to help and require data reporting on sites.
We have submitted the following @nyccouncil editorial legislation:
* require at least one covid vaccination site (POD) in each postal code to be open 24/7
* requires activation of NYC Medical Reserve Corps for vaccination program
(1/2)– Mark D. Levine (@MarkLevineNYC) January 3, 2021
Prioritization is essential.
But giving a vaccine to a lower priority person is better than giving it to no one.
If a site is not using all of its slots / doses on a given day, it should be able to offer injections to those with lower priority. (From now on they could be fined for it)
– Mark D. Levine (@MarkLevineNYC) January 4, 2021
The mayor was receptive when asked about Levine’s proposal on Monday.
Vaccination centers and clinics opening from Tuesday will have hours from 8 or 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.
New York Health Commissioner Dave Chokshi said vaccination centers will be staffed with a pool of 13,000 medical staff in the city’s reserve corps, and other city employees could be enlisted for help.
“Several of the hospitals I have visited are immunizing very late at night and early in the morning,” said Chokshi. “They found that this was actually the best way to maximize throughput for people arriving on their night shift or leaving their night shift, and several hospitals have also started nighttime immunizations. I encourage as many hospitals as possible to speed up this week, if you haven’t already. “
Supplies are also needed. The mayor’s pledge to administer 1 million doses by the end of January would require almost double the city’s currently allocated doses of 585,850.
De Blasio is counting on the federal government to allocate more doses to New York City as its ability to give people injections increases.
“We need the federal government to continue to allocate procurement to New York. We need the manufacturers to keep producing it and delivering it. We have enough to move on from this week to next week. We don’t have enough for a whole month yet, ”said the mayor.
Chokshi called on hospitals to vaccinate more people on weekends for longer hours.
Public hospitals with Health + Hospitals administer doses on weekends, but a spokesperson for the health system did not immediately provide information on weekend capacity.
State health officials say New York’s public hospitals administered 31 percent of their assigned doses, compared to 99 percent in the New York-Presbyterian healthcare system, for example.
Governor Andrew Cuomo blamed him on a “management problem” and threatened with fines and revocation of future vaccine allocations to vaccine suppliers if doses are not used within seven days – a move criticized by the government. town hall as “punitive”. Hospitals also face severe state penalties if they distribute the vaccine to recipients outside the current priority group.
“We don’t even hand out the offer that we have,” Levine said. “So right now it’s about expanding our capabilities and overcoming the logistical challenges that are important.”
Rachael Piltch-Loeb, a public health emergency preparedness researcher, said she anticipates staffing and communication will be a challenge for scaling up immunizations.
“Ongoing challenges will remain in terms of staffing to actually administer the vaccine and communication to tell people they are eligible and where and when to go,” Piltch-Loeb, Harvard Preparation Fellow TH Chan School of Public Health and scientific research associate at NYU, said in an email. “Priority immunization groups by themselves should not be the problem with low immunization rates.”
“Priority groups help to ensure equitable distribution of the vaccine,” added Piltch-Loeb. Health workers are already caring for patients and administering doses in some cases. “[T]Logistics allowing hospitals to initially vaccinate their staff may have helped slow the deployment. “
“The perfect cannot be the enemy of the good when it comes to priority groups,” she said.
Other experts called for a concrete national strategy.
The federal nursing home dose program has been slow. In New York City, about 47% of the 288 facilities involved in the federal nursing home program with CVS and Walgreens have completed the first doses, according to Cuomo. At a press conference Monday, Cuomo said 85% of residents in nursing homes across the state will receive the vaccine by the end of the week.
City council will hold a watch hearing on January 12 regarding the slow deployment in New York City.
New Yorkers are rightly concerned about the slow rollout of vaccines so far. We will hold a monitoring hearing on Tuesday, January 12 to determine whether the city is doing everything in its power to vaccinate New Yorkers safely and effectively as quickly as possible.
– Corey Johnson, Chairman of the New York Council (@NYCSpeakerCoJo) January 4, 2021
On Monday, healthcare workers began giving a second injection, which provides better protection against the virus – around 95% effectiveness in the original studies by Pfizer and Moderna.
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