Texas receives 200,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine, especially for “vaccination centers”

Texas will receive about 200,000 additional doses of COVID-19 vaccine next week, most of it for large “vaccination centers” that can vaccinate up to 100,000 people – helping to streamline distribution as eligible Texans grow, officials said Thursday. Of the state.

“These immunization centers will provide people in those priority populations with identifiable vaccination sites and an easier way to sign up for a meeting with each provider,” the Texas Department of Health Services said in a statement. written statement.

Officials warned that even after the next delivery, the state’s total allocation reaches 1.7 million by mid-December, the state is still far from what it needs to vaccinate the millions of Texans currently eligible for the vaccine and that ” it will take time ”for supply to catch up with demand.

Nearly 1.4 million doses had been delivered by the end of Wednesday, according to state figures. The state does not publicly report how many doses the suppliers received. At least 475,000 Texans received the first dose of vaccine and more than 6,500 were completely inoculated with the two required doses, according to state data, although these figures lag behind in real time due to reporting delays.

A list of major suppliers identified as hubs will be released later in the week, the agency said.

Most of next week’s allocation will go to them, but shipments will also go to some smaller suppliers, the agency said.

Larger centers will have to create phone numbers and registration sites and focus their efforts on affected populations in the surrounding areas, the agency said. They will be instructed to continue vaccinating health workers, people over the age of 65 and those with medical conditions that increase their risk.

The news comes as eligible Texans across the country seek answers and access to the vaccine after state officials announced in late December that hospitals should begin vaccinating the elderly and those with underlying conditions, a group known as 1B, who did not qualify in the first round for photos reserved for health care workers and residents of nursing homes and long-term care units, a group known as 1A, if they are left without 1A people who want the shot.

Group 1A includes approximately 1.9 million people in Texas. Group 1B has about 8 million people, although state officials said an undetermined number of people fall into both groups.