Alabama has lowest COVID vaccine rate in country, CDC says



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Alabama is currently ranked last on a CDC scorecard showing the percentage of each state’s population that has received the COVID-19 vaccine.

Alabama reported the lowest COVID vaccination rate of any state on Thursday afternoon, and the only state listed as having administered the vaccine to less than 2% of its population.

According to the dashboard, Alabama administered at least the first dose of the vaccine to 92,300 people, or about 1.9% of the population.

The Alabama Department of Public Health, which administers the vaccine rollout in the state, says it disagrees with the data.

“Data from the Alabama Department of Public Health (ADPH) does not match CDC data at this time,” ADPH’s Dr. Karen Landers said Thursday by email. “ADPH is investigating this issue to ensure that all doses administered by Alabama are counted.”

The CDC’s scorecard currently shows Alabama with the lowest vaccination rate of any state, with many other southeastern states ranked near the bottom. Georgia comes in second after vaccinating 2.2% of its population, followed by South Carolina with 2.3%. The dashboard shows how many people per 100,000 population in each state received at least one dose of the vaccine. Alabama’s number was 1,882 people per 100,000 population, or 1.9% of the total population.

Many areas of Alabama only offer the vaccine to people in phase 1a of the state’s vaccine allocation plan, frontline healthcare workers, and people living in nursing homes or nursing homes. long-term care facilities.

Starting Monday, the state will offer vaccines to people aged 75 and older, as well as emergency first responders statewide, but there are few places people can get a vaccine. . However, some states, including Texas and California, have already started offering the vaccines to anyone over 65.

The CDC this week recommended that all states immediately open vaccines to people 65 and older. The decision rests with the States. However, the CDC also announced plans to reward states that distribute vaccines faster by sending them a larger share of the vaccine.

A statewide hotline to make appointments to receive a vaccine was inundated with 1.1 million calls on the first day of its operations, and the department reported that appointments are no longer available . Instead, the department takes caller information and puts them on a waiting list when other appointments are available.

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