Florida issues new residence rules for Covid-19 vaccines to reduce ‘vaccine tourism’

Florida issues new residence rules for Covid-19 vaccines to reduce ‘vaccine tourism’

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The state’s surgeon general, Dr. Scott Rivkees, signed a public health statement prioritizing Florida residents for vaccines, days after Governor Ron DeSantis publicly said that vaccines should be reserved for part-time or full-time residents of the State of the Sun.

“We are doing (injections) only for Florida residents,” said DeSantis on Tuesday in Cape Coral. “You have to live here full time or at least part time.”

In another press conference at Rockledge on Tuesday, DeSantis differentiated between “snow birds”, who live in Florida in the winter months, and those who just stop to try to get vaccinated.

“We now have part-time residents who stay here all winter,” he said. “They go to the doctors here or whatever, that’s fine. What we don’t want are tourists, foreigners. We want to put the elderly first, but obviously we want to put the people who live here first in line.”

The change came after news reports reported that some non-Floridians, including people with a second home in Florida and several wealthy Argentines, traveled to Florida to get vaccinated.
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As of January 19, Florida vaccinated more than 39,000 people living outside the state, including more than 1,000 who received the two recommended doses, according to data from the Florida Department of Health. That is about 3.5% of the 1.12 million people who were vaccinated in Florida. State data do not differentiate tourists from part-time residents.
The revelations generated frustration among Florida residents who failed to get vaccinated, were forced to wait in hour-long lines or frustrated by confusing or unstable websites.

But the issue is not specific to Florida. Vaccine tourism is the result of some key factors: vaccine shortages compared to demand; the disorganized start to administer the shots; and the lack of consistent federal guidelines, which generated different availability of vaccines between states and even between municipalities.

Dr Peter Hotez, a vaccine specialist and dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, said that vaccine tourism highlighted the failures of the slow implementation of the federal vaccine.

“If we are still in that situation a month from now, we will have a lot of problems,” he said.

Why people travel to get a vaccine

Florida allowed anyone aged 65 and over to be vaccinated, regardless of where they lived, making it one of the first states to open up to that age group.

In contrast, many other US states have residency requirements and instruct people to bring identity documents, mail or proof of rental to prove it. Several states have also approached the Phase 1b guidelines recommended by the CDC vaccine committee, which say vaccines should go to adults 75 and older and essential frontline workers.
Of course, people desperate for the vaccine, able to travel and lucky enough to get an appointment with the vaccine on spoiled sites or hotlines, have gone a long way to get it.
Mark and Connie Wallace, who live in Shelby County, Alabama, told CNN affiliate WBMA that they had driven nearly two hours to Georgia to be vaccinated at a Publix pharmacy.
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“They knew we were coming from another state and said it was okay,” said Connie Wallace, “so we didn’t feel like we were pushing anyone out, which we didn’t want to do.”

Connie is 68 and has underlying health problems related to the heart, the WBMA reported. The couple got an online vaccine appointment and then ventured to Carrollton, Georgia, to get vaccinated.

“I would have gone eight hours away if I had to,” Mark Wallace told WBMA.

Similar interstate vaccinations have been observed in major metropolitan areas that cross borders.

New York City vaccinated health professionals or other essential professionals, such as teachers or firefighters who work in the city but live outside the five districts. According to New York data, about 73% of vaccinees in New York live in the city, 15% live in another part of New York state and the rest live in New Jersey, Connecticut or another state or have not provided residency.

As the federal government distributes the vaccine based on population, this created an uneven distribution.

Two weeks ago, Mayor Bill de Blasio sent a letter to then Vice President Mike Pence asking him to allocate more doses to “New York City and other jurisdictions that are vaccinating more than their residents”.

Vaccine tourism is no big deal, experts say

People wait in line to receive the Covid-19 vaccine on January 13 at a mass vaccination site in a Disneyland Resort parking lot in Anaheim, California.

Dr. William Schaffner, professor of infectious diseases at Vanderbilt University, said he acknowledged that a New Yorker might be frustrated when he saw a New Jersey traveler crossing state lines to get vaccinated.

But as long as the vaccine is being used instead of remaining untouched, it is not a public health problem.

“Instead of ‘it’s my vaccine, not yours’, (getting) the vaccine in arms is what we want,” he said. “I hope we have enough vaccine quickly so that we don’t have to dwell on these petty issues.”

The ultimate goal is to vaccinate enough Americans to achieve collective immunity, generally estimated at about 70 to 80% of people. Schaffner indicated that the high demand for the coronavirus vaccine is essentially a good problem at this point.

“There are people eager to get the vaccine – boy, is that a good thing,” he said. “So, we are not going to destroy your creativity and imagination.”

Hotez said he did not see vaccine tourism as a moral issue, but stressed that traveling during the pandemic has its own risks. And he noted that all states are struggling in the same way to administer enough vaccines because of federal problems.

“Vaccine tourists are probably preparing for disappointment,” he said.

CNN’s Maria Cartaya contributed to this report.

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