As a dangerous winter storm hits Texas, leaving millions without electricity and at least two people dead, public health officials are struggling to save one of the most essential commodities: coronavirus vaccines.
Large areas of the country have been hit by unprecedented winter conditions, but in Texas, which works largely with its own power grid, power outages have forced authorities to distribute COVID vaccines as quickly as possible.
Texas was already facing a delay in weekly CDC vaccine shipments on Friday in anticipation of the storm, said Chris Van Deusen, a spokesman for the Texas State Department of Health Services. Several counties announced that vaccination sites would be closed for days amid freezing conditions.
“No one wants to put the vaccine at risk when trying to apply it under dangerous conditions,” Van Deusen told BuzzFeed News. “Local providers have postponed vaccine clinics because it is not safe for people to be in much of Texas.”
In Harris County, the most populous in the state and one of the hardest hit by the storm, a series of failed energy events left authorities struggling to distribute vaccines just hours before they expired.
The building that stored the county’s modern vaccine supply lost power on Monday morning. So her backup generator failed and the refrigerator that stored the vaccines did not issue a warning that her temperature had risen above the level needed to maintain viable doses, Lina Hidalgo, county judge and director of emergency management for the hospital, told BuzzFeed. Harris County. News.
“When we realized what had happened, we had about six hours or more to deliver the vaccine. There were about 8,300 doses that we needed to deliver,” said Hidalgo. “We couldn’t ask people to drive anywhere because the roads were totally impassable.”
The authorities quickly devised a plan to find facilities with large numbers of people who had a medical team that could administer the vaccine. The county ended up distributing doses to three hospitals, the Harris County Jail – which is almost full and has seen outbreaks of COVID-19 among inmates – and Rice University.
“The moment we have vaccines that are about to spoil, we cannot say, ‘No, we are not going to give these people because they are too young’ or whatever. We have to get them into our arms,” said Hidalgo . “Usually, when we have the benefit of time and planning, we prioritize the elderly population, we make specific arrangements for vulnerable populations. But in this situation, it is about ensuring that these vaccines are not wasted ”.
Subsequently, the authorities received a response from Moderna, which advised on how to return vaccines to deposits.
Hidalgo called the race by county officials to distribute vaccines during the storm a “miraculous effort”.
“Everyone was in a massive mess,” she said. “Fortunately, not a single dose was missed, nor was a single bottle wasted.”
The COVID-19 test and vaccination appointments on Tuesday were similarly postponed in Austin, which continues to struggle with freezing rain. Austin Public Health officials did not respond to a request for comment, but on Monday said that stored vaccines would not be affected by power cuts, the Austin American-Statesman reported.
But the statewide delay caused by the weather further disrupts Texas’ mass vaccination effort, with which many residents are already frustrated. The deployment was first hampered by data problems that did not reflect actual vaccination rates, and as eligibility expanded, many older adults found themselves ill-equipped to schedule online appointments.
The treacherous temperatures are expected to last until Friday in some parts of the state, but Van Deusen said the next vaccine shipment was expected at least on Wednesday.
Hidalgo said the biggest disadvantage in relation to vaccines is that the storm will delay the distribution of the vaccine by at least two days.
“This is unfortunate,” she said. “It is time to distribute them.”