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After a week of confusing news about the failed COVID-19 vaccine deployment in South Carolina, state leaders and hospital administrators were blinded by devastating news on Friday.
The federal government has cut South Carolina’s planned supply of first doses of COVID-19 vaccines by 75 percent, according to a notice to hospital administrators from the South Carolina Hospital Association.
Now, after thousands of elderly South Carolina residents spent hours trying to sign up for appointments as the SC Department of Health and Environmental Control (SCDHEC) opened on Wednesday registration of people over 70, many of these hard-fought appointments will have to be canceled or postponed.
The letter from Thornton Kirby, CEO of the SC Hospital Association, said hospitals would receive 100% of second doses requested.
“Many hospitals are likely to cancel appointments for the first dose next week,” Kirby wrote in the letter.
Kirby also said he was concerned that “hospitals will be very reluctant to schedule appointments beyond next week due to an unpredictable supply.”
In a virtual meeting on Friday, Senator SC Tom davis broke the news to other Beaufort County officials.
“Hospitals will probably have to cancel appointments and worse yet, you will have to do it all over again,” Davis said. “It was all a colossal waste of time.”
Davis said the cuts are due to a lack of supply at the federal level.
“At the end of the day, what boils down here is that there aren’t enough vaccines currently allocated to states,” Davis said.
Hospital administrators are now in a difficult position because it is unclear how many appointments they can schedule.
Beaufort Memorial Hospital Officials said on Friday they were canceling more than 6,000 appointments scheduled until March. These appointments will remain unscheduled until the vaccines are available.
“We understand that the national vaccine supply is somewhat limited; however, the fact that we placed these orders over a week ago and are simply informed by the state that they cannot be fulfilled is disappointing, ”said Beaufort Memorial CEO Russell baxley said. “Hospitals in South Carolina have worked very hard to follow state guidelines to serve the best interests of our communities, but we cannot do it without consistent and reliable supplies.
CEO of Hilton Head Hospital Jeremy clark said Friday afternoon that his hospital will contact DHEC to get a better idea of the exact doses they will be assigned before starting to cancel or reschedule appointments.
Kirby said he asked DHEC officials to get them specific allowances for each hospital so they didn’t have to “guess.”
The rollout of the vaccine in South Carolina has so far been a total disaster. On Friday, SC ranked last among the country’s fifty states in terms of the number of Covid-19 vaccinations it has received.
According to the latest data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), as of January 14, 2021 only 6,808 vaccines have been distributed per 100,000 inhabitants of South Carolina.
This is the worst payout rate of any state in the country – which has put additional strain on the governor’s administration Henry mcmaster, Will Folks, founding editor of FITSNews, reported yesterday.
“To say that McMaster stuttered, fumbled and tripped over Covid-19 is to say it politely,” Folks wrote. “In addition, as we have often pointed out, his inconsistent handling of the pandemic had considerably undermined his political strength.”
Now that state leaders have overestimated the expected number of vaccines, the situation looks grim.
We will continue to report on the vaccine rollout and get answers to many of these unanswered questions. Stay tuned…
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