I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but 2021 will not be much different from 2020 if the country (and the world, in this case) fails to act together with the vaccine.
As Britain moves forward with a questionable strategy of mix different vaccines products, the new COVID-19 strain first reported outside the UK was found in Colorado and California this week, and Los Angeles continues to fight a devastating increase in coronavirus cases.
Despite the clearly still active spread of COVID-19, the hope that has emerged in the form of two highly effective vaccines launched in late 2020 is now being tempered by a confusion of implementation problems.
Although more than 14 million doses of vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna have been shipped across the U.S., the New York Times reports that only about 2 million people received even the first dose. The federal government had set a goal to vaccinate up to 20 million people by the end of 2020, but that goal was far from being achieved and there is no single – or clear – answer as to why.
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Trump administration Operation Warp Speed officials suggested the vacation period may be affecting vaccination efforts, while Trump blamed individual states for slow release. In December, several state governors called the federal government to send fewer doses of vaccine to their regions than promised.
But a problem that affects vaccine acceptance may also be the reluctance of healthcare professionals who were placed first in line to receive protection from COVID-19. Both the LA Times and NPR are reporting that frontline staff in hospitals in California and Chicago, respectively, have avoided receiving doses of the vaccine.
In Riverside County, California, almost 50% of qualified health professionals have refused the vaccine. Although some refusals came from pregnant front-line workers, concerned with getting the vaccine (the Center for Disease Control says there are limited data on the safety of vaccines given to pregnant or lactating women), others are avoiding taking doses out of fear, as well as distrust of the government.
“It is not shocking, given what the federal government has done in the last 10 months,” Sal Rosselli, president of the National Health Workers Union, told the LA Times.
In a December survey conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation, three out of ten health professionals said they “probably or definitely” would not be vaccinated.
Then there are incidents of health personnel deliberately sabotaging vaccines or disrupting dose distribution for those who actively seek them.
In Tennessee, WRCB 3 News reports that on Friday Hamilton County Health Department officials rejected dozens of people who stood in line for hours waiting for a vaccine, saying there was limited supply. Later that day, health department officials were found to distribute doses to “close contacts”, that is, people who were friends and relatives of those who administered the vaccine.
And the police arrested a pharmacist who worked at Advocate Aurora Health Hospital in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on New Year’s Eve, on the grounds that he removed 570 doses of the Modern vaccine from cold storage and left them sitting overnight, intentionally making them the “useless” ones.
According to a statement by Grafton Police, who arrested the worker this week but have not yet identified him, 57 doses of the spoiled vaccine were administered to patients. Although hospital officials said there were no health problems related to receiving the destroyed vaccines, the worker wrote a statement admitting that he intentionally spoiled the doses by removing them from the refrigerator. Police say he also knew that people who received the damaged doses would think they were protected from the virus, when in fact they were not.
The suspect has not yet been formally charged, but the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel identified Steven Brandenburg, 46, a licensed pharmacist, was charged on preliminary charges filed by the Grafton Police in his statement about the arrest.
President-elect Biden has a big battle ahead of him as he takes over the White House and the ongoing fight against the coronavirus pandemic – the main one is to attract more audiences on board with a collective response to protect us from the disease.