The Elusive COVID Vaccine

Sometime today, the Columbia County Department of Health posted some new information on its website: https://www.columbiacountynyhealth.com/news/new-covid-19-vaccine-information/. Under the head "Vaccine Appointments and PODs," this statement is made:

• This week, January 24, 2021, to January 31, 2021, CCDOH was sent only 200 doses of vaccine and directed that 100 doses go to 65+ people and 100 doses to 1B Essential Workers.

On Tuesday, at around 3:00 p.m., CCDOH made appointments available to essential workers only. To my knowledge, and I checked the site regularly, appointments were never made available to people 65 and over.

Under the head "People 65+," CCDOH provides this information:

• NYS has directed the CCDOH CAN NOT provide vaccine to people 65+ unless they (NYS) send vaccine doses designed specifically for people 65+.
• CCDOH will continue to provide COVID vaccine to 65+ people, but can only do this when directed by NYS. We have no control over how much or when they will do this.

This section goes on to advise about vaccine for those over 65 being administered by pharmacies, none of which actually have the vaccine, but questions remain: What happened to the 100 doses that were supposed to go to people 65 and over this week? When and how were appointments made available to this group?

Also, for those dutifully checking the CCDOH website regularly for available appointments, this information was provided:

• Until there is an adequate supply of vaccine provided on a weekly basis, there will be NO LINK on the CCDOH website for POD appointments registration for the general public. This may continue for 4 weeks or more.
• CCDOH will continue posting appointment registration links on our website when the weekly supply of vaccine allows us to do to.

This seems to be in contradiction to what Governor Andrew Cuomo announced on Tuesday: ". . . allocations to states will go up 16 percent and . . . we can count on that allocation for the next three weeks. So far, we've been going week to week and now with advance notice we can plan better and that is good news." Presumably, CCDOH will continue receiving doses of the vaccine. One has to wonder how they will be distributed.

COPYRIGHT 2021 CAROLE OSTERINK