Facing the persistent shortage of the coronavirus vaccine, Sonoma County canceled vaccinations next week for people who had signed up for the first vaccines and closed clinics scheduled to immunize teachers and others who work with children.
Instead, the county will reserve its inadequate supply of the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines to prioritize second doses for people who received the first vaccine earlier this month, a vital step that increases immunity to the virus to about 95%.
The erasure of the planned clinics at Rancho Cotate High School in Rohnert Park, which were organized in conjunction with the Sonoma County Education Office, threatens to set the clock on the delayed return to school for most students in the county.
“It is very frustrating,” said Dr. Urmila Shende, county vaccine chief. “There is nothing we can do about it.”
Although the county has the infrastructure to deliver more than 40,000 doses per week, it expects to receive just enough vaccine to deliver 7,680 doses next week, roughly the same as it received this week, but slightly less than the 8,025 doses it received in the week last, Shende said.
Vaccine supply may start to increase next week if federal regulators approve the new Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which requires only a single injection to be effective. The Biden government told California it can expect to receive 380,000 vaccines from Johnson & Johnson next week and Governor Gavin Newsom said it expects the same amount each week for three weeks.
The distribution of the J&J vaccine still depends on federal action by the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, although Newsom said he was confident of rapid approval and availability.
The state, which currently administers about 1.4 million doses per week due to a lack of supplies, announced that it would be able to administer 3 million doses per week starting on Monday.
As of Monday, the county-by-county system used to determine eligibility for the vaccine will be replaced by a single state standard, the state’s Department of Health Services announced. All health care providers and local health jurisdictions will pass a uniform, state-driven eligibility criterion, eliminating confusion about who is eligible to receive the vaccine.
Confusion over eligibility plagued the Sonoma County vaccination campaign, leading to the cancellation of thousands of consultations in late January scheduled by people who qualified under the state standard but did not meet county guidelines.
But the biggest problem today is the supply of vaccines, which simply do not meet public demand for immunizations or even the municipality’s ability to administer vaccines.
Last week, the national vaccine supply chain was interrupted by severe winter storms that covered much of the country. Sonoma County health officials have confirmed that this is no longer an issue. However, the county’s allocation by the state has been stagnating at best lately. The same is true for other counties, said Ken Tasseff, county vaccination site coordinator.
Asked why allocations are backing down, Sonoma County Supervisor Lynda Hopkins said, “I think we really need to ask the state of California this question.”
Representatives from the California Department of Public Health did not respond to a request for comment Friday afternoon.
Frustrated by the shortage of the county’s dose supply, Hopkins wondered aloud if the county had been cut by Blue Shield, who was hired by the state as a third-party administrator, or TPA, overseeing its new centralized delivery and appointment system . Blue Shield is expanding the system into three waves, initially focusing on 10 counties in central and southern California. Sonoma and Lake counties are in the second wave of 28 counties that will begin the transition to the new network on Monday, while Marin, Napa and Mendocino counties are in the third wave that will begin to merge into the system on March 7. .
“For a while, we have been on a very hopeful path,” said Hopkins. “So the TPA process started at the state level, the first wave was launched, it was very clear that there was a big focus on the TPA counties in the first wave and suddenly our supply was either stable or declining.”
As the Blue Shield program expands, MyTurn.ca.gov will become the primary source for Californians to sign up for consultations. Sonoma County residents can register to be notified when they become eligible or when consultations begin.
For now, Tasseff said the flow of vaccines is so tight that the county is able to fulfill its existing second dose appointments just because Kaiser Permanente is “helping” us with 250 doses.