Staff at Kaiser Permanente Lakewood medical offices poured 165 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine on Thursday after they were destroyed after a power outage at the facility.
The power outage, which Kaiser said was brief and caused by strong winds, caused a refrigerator that stored doses of Moderna vaccine to stop working, causing the vaccines to exceed the required storage temperature.
The unit’s staff worked throughout the day to administer as many doses of the vaccine as possible and were able to deliver 135 vaccines before the vaccine expired, Kaiser said in a statement.
“The power to the facility and the refrigerator has been restored and the refrigerator in this location used to store the Modern COVID-19 vaccines is working correctly again,” the statement said. “No other Kaiser Permanente facility was affected.”
The incident reflects how fragile the COVID-19 vaccines are. For example, Pfizer doses should be stored at extremely low temperatures. Both injections must be administered quickly. The state has also told providers, such as local public health agencies and hospitals, that they must administer the vaccines within 72 hours of receiving them.
Colorado receives about 70,000 doses of the vaccine each week.
It is the second known case of COVID-19 vaccines being discarded. Pueblo Local Public Health “rendered 300 doses of the Pfizer vaccine unusable after a portable vaccine storage unit malfunctioned,” a spokesman for the Colorado Department of Public Health and the Environment said in an email.
“The state’s goal is to use all available vaccines, recognizing that emergencies may occur infrequently in the distribution process,” said the spokesman.
As of Wednesday, Colorado had administered 270,800 doses of COVID-19. That includes giving 46,897 people their second injection, according to the state health department.
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