Utah has expanded its vaccine rollout plan to now include school teachers and residents over the age of 70.
Summit County residents 70-years or older, looking for a COVID-19 vaccine appointment, could have to wait a few weeks to find an open spot, according to Derek Moss with the Summit County Health Department.
But it’s not a personnel issue, instead it’s a supply problem, which is an issue happening across Utah and the nation.
Utah Gov. Spencer Cox issued an order earlier this month to use all available doses of vaccine within a week of receiving them. He said so far, local health departments have been able to keep up.
“Right now in our local health departments, which are now driving most of the of the vaccinations,” Cox said. “They have used 94% of the vaccines that are over seven days old, we only have 1,800 doses that are over seven days old. And those will be used up this week.”
Cox said concern over the shortage of vaccines will hopefully be remedied in the near future.
“The next big piece that we're working on with [the new presidential administration] is to get better insight into the flow of vaccines, and how that will increase over time as manufacturing increases, and as new manufacturers come on board,” he said. “Of course, we have two other vaccine candidates that we know are just weeks away from getting approval, that's what we've been told. And we do believe that that will double or more than double the number of first doses that are coming into our state.”
Despite a shortage, the Utah Coronavirus dashboard shows some 5,200 doses distributed to out of state/unknown people. Moss said the Summit County Health Department is focusing on vaccinating county residents and is checking credentials and residential status. He said the department is vaccinating out of town residents on a case-by-case basis.
He said the department can’t keep up with the demand and has put in a request to receive more weekly doses of vaccines.
