Huntsville Hospital will not make further appointments for COVID-19 vaccinations for the next month due to a drop in the state’s vaccine supply.
The northern Alabama hospital system said today that it will stop making new appointments for its Community Vaccination Clinic by the week of March 22. People with existing appointments should come at the scheduled time, unless contacted by the hospital, the hospital said.
The hospital said state officials said it “will only receive enough vaccine for 1,000 new doses per week, which is less than half of the previous allocation for Huntsville Hospital”.
“If you are one of the thousands on the waiting list, you will not receive a scheduled call for at least two weeks,” the statement said.
The hospital said “the distribution of vaccines sent from the state of Alabama to hospitals in the area has been reduced in recent days, forcing hospitals to reduce the number of first doses they can deliver”. Some locations are already without their first doses, the hospital said, and more than 45,000 people are on vaccine waiting lists across the northern Alabama system.
Alabama health officer Dr. Scott Harris said today that the state is not receiving enough doses every week to supply the drive-thru clinics that helped Alabama deliver more than 76,000 vaccines in the week of February 6. . The Huntsville Hospital clinic in Huntsville is not drive-through, but administered more than 1,000 doses a day during the statewide vaccination outbreak earlier this month.
Harris cited shipping delays caused by the weather and worsening virus conditions at the site of a major Alabama supplier. “We certainly had some questions about shipping delays because of the weather. We certainly had shipping delays in several counties, ”he said today. “We had some municipalities that, you know, received vaccines, but only had clinics that were canceled. But we had some clinics that just couldn’t be opened to deliver anything.
“And, of course, many of our deliveries come from the Memphis area to Alabama and, of course, are worse than they are now,” said Harris.
Harris said the state is talking to vaccine makers McKesson and Pfizer “directly about their shipments every day, almost every hour, and trying to ensure that all of these things are put back on time.”
“It certainly delayed some clinics for people,” said Harris. “We received several calls from providers across the state who were anticipating the arrival of a second dose, and it will only take a few days. But they will all arrive eventually. “
AL.com reporter Dennis Pillion contributed to this report