Health officials worry that country is not ready for the COVID-19 vaccine

Millions of Americans rely on the COVID-19 vaccine to curb global pandemics and bring lives back to normal.

One or more options may become available later this year or early next year, but how to deliver vaccines to 330 million people still remains to the local health authorities expected to do the work. I’m not sure.

Dr. Umair Shah, executive director of public health departments in Harris Texas, including Houston, said:

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention instructed the local Ministry of Health to develop an immunization plan “in time for the earliest possible release of the COVID-19 vaccine” by October 1.

But the health sector, which has been short of money for decades, says it lacks the staff, money, and tools to educate people about vaccines and then distribute, manage, and track hundreds of millions of doses. .. They also do not know when they will receive or get federal assistance to do so.

Dozens of doctors, nurses, and health officials interviewed by KHN and AP expressed concern over the country’s readiness to carry out mass vaccination, leading to months of conflict from the federal government. Expressed dissatisfaction with the information.

In the gap, figure out how personnel can track who got what dose, how to keep workers giving shots safe, and how to do work with adequate protective equipment and syringes. It is included.

Molly Howell, who administers North Dakota, educates people about the benefits of vaccination, as a poll from the AP-NORC Center for Public Relations and Research states that only about half of Americans are vaccinated. Is also important. Of a health vaccination program.

The United States has committed more than $10 billion to the development of new coronavirus vaccines, but has not specifically allocated their distribution and management.

And local governments have received billions of dollars in congressional funding, which has not been allocated to distribute vaccines.

An ongoing study by KHN and AP details how state and local public health departments across the United States have been starving for decades and lacking sufficient resources to face coronavirus pandemics. Is shown. The study further found that the Federal Coronavirus fund took a long time to reach the public health sector, forcing it to cancel services that some communities needed.

The State is allowed to use some of the federal funds it has already received in preparation for vaccination. However, AP and KHN have found that many health departments are overwhelmed by the current costs of pandemics (testing, contact tracking, etc.) and cannot secure the funds to spend on vaccine operations. The health department needs to hire people to administer the vaccine and systems to keep track of them, and pay for supplies such as protective masks, gowns, gloves, warehouses, and refrigerator space.

For example, Pima County, Arizona, is already short of at least $30 million in addition to what health officials need to fight a pandemic, said Dr. Francisco Garcia, Deputy County Secretary and Chief Medical Officer. It was

Some federal funds will soon expire. For example, the $150 billion state and local governments received from the CARES law fund only covered expenses made by the end of the year, said Gretchen Musicant, a Minneapolis health commissioner. This is a problem. It is possible that vaccine distribution has not yet begun.

Public health officials say they need help, but Congress left Washington to spend summer vacation without passing a new pandemic rescue bill, which included additional funding for vaccine distribution.

The state cannot use existing funding sources to attempt the largest vaccination campaign in history, said Dr. Kelly Moore of the Vaccine Action Alliance, the national vaccine education and advocacy group.

Then there is the basic issue of scale. Last winter, the country distributed 175 million vaccines for seasonal influenza vaccines, according to the CDC.

But in order for the United States to reach herd immunity to coronaviruses, most experts say, Americans will need to vaccinate approximately 70% of Americans, or 200 million. Two vaccinations, or 400 million vaccinations, are required for the first vaccine to be effective.

Experts expect that many public health departments will struggle to properly track who has been vaccinated and when. Because of the lack of funding in recent decades, they are in a technical dark age.

Moore, the medical director of the H1N1 influenza pandemic vaccination plan in Tennessee, said the medical institution would have to administer a second dose of COVID-19 after the first 21 or 28 days. He said he needs to call attention to the patient to be treated. They also need to make sure that the second dose is of the same brand as the first.

She expects many states to face significant challenges when trying to describe and report vaccinations up to the doses required by the CDC.

CDC is developing an app called the Vaccine Management Monitoring System for healthcare departments with lagging data systems, said Claire Hannan, Executive Director of Association of Immunization Managers.

The health sector, meanwhile, deals with vaccine registrations dating back to the late 1980s.

Overwhelmed public health teams have already taken the time to test patients and track their contact. This is a time-consuming process that needs to continue even after the vaccine is available. If that happens, the health department will need more staff for a variety of tasks, including public education, patient monitoring, and reporting of serious side effects.

Dr. Ngozi Ezike, director of the Illinois Department of Health, said at the August conference on the distribution of vaccines that nursing students, medical students, dentists, dental hygienists, and even veterinarians had additional medical expertise managing shots. He said he needs to hire a house. Such vaccinations will need medical grade masks, gowns and gloves to keep them safe.

One vaccine candidate should be stored at minus 94 degrees Fahrenheit because vaccines are much more complex than personal protective equipment and other medical supplies. Be prepared for shortages, delays, and mistakes.

“It will be even worse than the test and PPE problem,” said Prescia.

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Szabo is a KHN writer. Associated Press correspondent Michelle R. Smith and KHN Midwest correspondent Lauren Weber contributed to this report.

This article is a collaboration between AP and KHN, a non-profit news service that covers health issues. This is an editorial independent program of the Kaiser Family Foundation. KHN is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente.

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