SANDY – Thanks to a big mistake over the weekend, Utah didn’t vaccinate nearly as many people as it could on Monday – one of several consequences in the real world.
Over the weekend, word spread that Utah had too many vaccines and that eligibility was being opened and that anyone who wanted to apply could. And 7,200 relatively young, healthy people believed they were doing the right thing when they signed up for consultations to be vaccinated.
It just so happened that it was just a rumor compounded by a flaw in the state’s website, where people can make an appointment. When the dust settled, it meant that 7,200 appointments had to be canceled. Some of those vacancies were for Monday and no one else rescheduled them, said Gabe Moreno, a spokesman for the Salt Lake County Health Department.
“It is very unfortunate that we still have many public health nurses ready to start giving these injections, but we do not have people to fill them,” said Moreno.
We asked Moreno if one day of many empty chairs at vaccination sites, when there is a high demand for Utahns ready for their vaccines, it shows a broken system.
“That would be an issue for the state,” he replied. “We followed the details of the state guidelines for vaccinating certain priority groups and moved on to those (groups) based on the state guidelines.”
We contacted Governor Spencer J. Cox’s office and asked if the number of unused nominations is a sign that the state should expand eligibility for more people.
“The answer is not yet,” said spokeswoman Jennifer Napier-Pearce in a statement. “So far, only 41% of 65-69 year olds have received at least one dose. (Seventy) + is 74% with at least one dose.”
And although she did not have the available number of Utahns aged 16 and over with serious health problems, she said “this has only been in place for four days, so the percentage is probably low.
Low, like the number of chairs occupied on Monday inside the Mountain America Expo Center in Sandy, a place that is usually one of the busiest vaccination sites in Utah.
“We have less crowded appointments,” described Lee Cherie Booth, a nursing supervisor at the site for the Salt Lake County Department of Health.
Asked if there was a lot of waste on Monday, she said: “Yes, today, potentially. But that does not reflect what we are normally doing.”
If there is a silver lining in the weekend’s error with the online registration site, it may well be that the wasted day is not adding up to the waste of vaccines.
“If we don’t use all that vaccine that we brought to the site today, we can take it back to the fridge and it can stay in the fridge for up to five days,” she said.
Nicholas Rupp, of the Salt Lake County Department of Health, elaborated more on what happens to unused doses.
“After thawing, the Pfizer vaccine should be used in five days and Moderna in 30 days, so we have many opportunities to use the vaccine in case of a no-show,” he said in a statement. “The vaccine remains refrigerated until the dose container is in place so that the residues are minimal or nonexistent. In the extremely rare case where we have an extra dose in a bottle at the end of the day, we vaccinate a member of the team or a volunteer who does not has still been vaccinated. “
We also asked Rupp about a screenshot of the state’s vaccination calendar taken at 11 am on Monday, showing many available time slots – a few minutes after the screen shot – that have not been completed.
This photo was taken shortly after 11 am today. See all available appointments that have not been used. Each of these time intervals can reach 50, I learned. Arriving in @ KSL5TV News at 17:00 and 18:00, why waste and what happens to the vaccine when applications are not made? pic.twitter.com/mMOFxB3IkK
– Matt Gephardt KSL (@KslMatt) March 1, 2021
“Each appointment slot can accommodate 30-50 people depending on the location, so when you see an available slot as in the picture, it can be 49 people booked with one available,” he replied.
“We may be a little frustrated as a community because maybe we are one day late in getting things back to normal,” Matt Gephardt of KSL asked Booth at the Expo Center. “But aren’t we necessarily frustrated because we’re putting a lot of vaccine in the bathroom?”
“Okay. We are not wasting vaccine,” said Booth. “It can take half a day or a day today without filling out all of our appointments.”