Errors in administering doses of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine have prompted the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) to send alerts to more than 6,000 people who may have received doses lower than those intended by health officials.
From the afternoon of February 28 to the afternoon of March 1, those who arrived at the Oakland Coliseum in Oakland, California, to receive the first dose of the vaccine, may have received 0.22 milliliters of the Pfizer vaccine instead of the recommended 0.3 ml by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said a CDPH official Newsweek.
The 0.22 ml dose amount is still within the volume considered safe by the CDC, which informed the CDPH that any dose of Pfizer vaccine that is between 0.15 and 0.3 ml is safe. The CDC rules mean that the 0.22 ml doses believed to have been administered at the Oakland Coliseum on February 28 and March 1 are “well within” that safety range.
“The dosage difference was corrected by the team on the spot on Monday [March 1] later, and CDPH implemented additional training and quality assurance steps as a preventive measure, “said the CDPH official.
Although some local media reported that new Pfizer syringes caused the problem, CDPH said that was not the case.
“This was caused by human error, not a problem with syringes,” said the CDPH official.
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The CDPH said it had sent alerts to approximately 6,300 individuals who had had vaccinations at the Oakland Coliseum on the two dates in question to notify them of the dosing problem. According to a copy of the letter provided by the CDPH, the alert was valid for those who received the vaccine after 4:30 pm on February 28 and between 8:00 am and 3:00 pm on March 1.
Those who received doses of the COVID-19 vaccine during these time periods do not need to take any action, because the doses of the vaccine are considered to be administered within the CDC’s safety guidelines, the letter said.
“Although the recommended dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine is 0.3 ml, the CDC has determined that any dosage of 0.15 ml or greater is safe and does not require that the dose be repeated to protect people against COVID-19” , says the letter said. “In this case, some individuals may have received a dose between 0.22 ml and 0.3 ml that is well within the range defined by the CDC and the dose does not need to be repeated.”
The letter continued to encourage those who have so far received only one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine to return three weeks after the first dose to complete the vaccination process.
Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine is one of three that have been approved for emergency use by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the USA. Vaccines created by Pfizer and Moderna require two doses, while the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was approved by the FDA and emergency use last month consists of a single dose.
California health officials have reported more COVID-19 infections to date than any other state in the U.S. As of Monday, more than 3.5 million cases have been reported in California since the pandemic began, with more than 54,000 COVID-19-related deaths reported across the state. Vaccination data published on the CDPH website showed that more than 10.5 million people in California received the COVID-19 vaccine earlier in the week.