Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association (VHHA) routinely releases weekly updates on the current status of COVID vaccinations.
None have been so chilling — or underreported — as this:
Virginia recently modified its vaccine distribution plan – the Commonwealth is now sending vaccines to local health departments for distribution. Hospitals are no longer receiving direct vaccine dose shipments. As a result, Virginia hospitals currently have about 22,000 first doses remaining after this week’s allocation from local health departments. That is the equivalent of a few days’ supply of doses which will soon be exhausted.
Northam’s spat with Virginia hospitals over our last in the nation COVID response has been abysmal to say the least.
With Northam effectively blaming already overworked doctors and nurses for not working hard enough during the pandemic, Northam’s punishment for his administration’s poor planning has been simple and direct — remove the vaccines from the hospitals and transfer them to ill-equipped local health boards… who will in turn be forced to rely upon Virginia hospitals for resources such as staff and special cold storage equipment for the mRNA vaccines.
With local health boards scrambling for answers and Northam continuing to point fingers, we could be in the very real position of COVID vaccines being available and ready to go… but because of a minor spat with Virginia’s hospitals, Northam will hold them back out of pure spite.
What’s more, this gap jeopardizes the necessary four week stay between the first shot and the booster required for the COVID vaccine to work. What happens if families have to wait five weeks between shots? Six weeks? Seven weeks before Northam re-integrates hospitals into his statewide plan?
Either way, as Virginians remain on pins and needles to see how Northam intends to iron out this self-inflicted mess, other states continue to outpace and outperform the Old Dominion.