By Brianna Abbott and Melanie Grayce West
The severe weather sweeping across the U.S. is disrupting
Covid-19 vaccine distribution, complicating a bumpy rollout that
had started smoothing out only in recent weeks.
A brutal winter storm, which left millions of Americans without
electricity, water and heat in freezing conditions, has also closed
some Covid-19 vaccination and testing sites and delayed vaccine
shipments to states. The disruption has forced health authorities
and government officials to postpone or cancel appointments across
the country.
Federal officials are projecting widespread delays in vaccine
shipments and deliveries over the next few days. The weather has
affected operations at the FedEx Corp. facility in Memphis, Tenn.,
and the United Parcel Service Inc. facility in Louisville, Ky.,
both of which are vaccine hubs for multiple states, the U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Wednesday.
In at least one instance, the power outages across several
states have threatened the storage of the Covid-19 vaccines, which
need to be kept at cold temperatures before administration. The
Harris County Public Health building in Houston lost power early
Monday morning, and the backup generator also failed, sending
health officials scrambling to administer 8,430 doses of the
Moderna Covid-19 vaccine, according to county officials.
"We got to work under the mission to avoid losing those vaccines
with the loss of power," Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo said at a
Monday media briefing. The doses were rushed off to local hospitals
and an academic center, as well as the county jail, and officials
were able to refreeze the rest, based on specific guidance from
Moderna.
The Houston Methodist hospital system received 1,000 doses from
the county, administering most on-site and sending a few hundred to
a nearby synagogue, said Roberta Schwartz, executive vice president
of Houston Methodist and its Covid-19 incidence manager. "We have
never wasted a drop of vaccine," she said.
Vaccinations across the country have picked up in recent weeks
following early missteps in distribution and administration.
Public-health authorities have been sprinting to speed up the
process of getting shots into patients' arms, as newer, highly
transmissible variants threaten to upend the sharp decline in
Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations seen in recent weeks.
The harrowing weather across swaths of the U.S., however, is
impeding the effort. Many vaccination and testing sites across
Texas closed over the weekend and earlier in the week, according to
local health officials, and some have yet to resume operations.
Mississippi's free drive-through Covid-19 testing sites were closed
Thursday, and almost all of the state-run vaccination sites were
closed, according to the Department of Health.
In the Memphis area, county health officials have closed all
vaccination sites through Feb. 20, moving all appointments to the
same day and time the following week. Washington state health
officials estimate that more than 90% of this week's allocation
will arrive late.
UPS suspended operations at its Louisville facility on Monday
night due to the snow and ice, with operations resuming on Tuesday
morning, the company said.
FedEx is leveraging its second-largest hub in Indianapolis,
along with smaller centers, to reroute vaccine shipments to as many
destinations as possible, a company spokeswoman said.
Icy, dangerous roads have made it difficult for doses to reach
health officials and vaccination sites and for patients to travel
to clinics that do have shots. The delays in shipments and
uncertainty of supply impedes the ability of health authorities to
plan ahead.
The loss of water in some locations has also slowed the rollout,
forcing many authorities to tackle that issue as a first priority,
said Julie Swann, head of the industrial and systems engineering
department at North Carolina State University. She estimated that
the current delays will likely set back vaccination efforts by
about a week, depending on the location.
Effects of the storm are also rippling across the country into
areas that haven't been hit as hard. Health officials in Georgia
and California have said that the postponed shipments will likely
result in providers being forced to reschedule appointments.
"While it might not snow in San Diego, the snow is directly
impacting San Diego," Nathan Fletcher, chair of the San Diego
County Board of Supervisors, said during a press conference on
Wednesday, after saying that several shipments set to arrive in the
county this week had been delayed.
In New Jersey, where snow fell steadily Thursday morning, Gov.
Phil Murphy said he was expecting supply-chain issues. "We're
working with a conservative expectation that our anticipated
deliveries will not arrive as scheduled," the Democrat said.
Mr. Murphy said many of the state's vaccine megasites would be
closed in anticipation of the storm, and appointments would be
rescheduled.
In New York City, there were around 17,500 first doses of
vaccine available on Thursday. Mayor Bill de Blasio said during a
press conference that vaccine shipments expected to arrive on
Tuesday or Wednesday likely won't arrive until Saturday or even
Sunday. The majority of vaccines haven't left factories, the
Democrat said.
"This is the situation we are in. It's been too hand-to-mouth in
general and then it's been made even worse by the storm," Mr. de
Blasio said.
In Rockland County, just north of New York City, officials have
rescheduled some appointments for second vaccine doses because of
the delayed shipments and said the dates and times of future
vaccination appointments will be based on supply. Vaccine shipments
have been "delayed in order to protect the integrity of the vaccine
to keep everyone safe," the department said.
In Jefferson County, in upstate New York, the county health
department on Thursday said vaccination clinics didn't receive
first doses this week. "At this time, it is not clear when the
vaccine shipments will arrive," the department said in an
advisory.
--Talal Ansari contributed to this article.
Write to Brianna Abbott at brianna.abbott@wsj.com and Melanie
Grayce West at melanie.west@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
February 18, 2021 19:38 ET (00:38 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2021 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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