Washington – As states work to accelerate the delivery of COVID-19 vaccines and improve the rocky rollout of the shootings, West Virginia Governor Jim Justice praised his state for its successful vaccine distribution, calling it the “diamond in the rough.” .
“Right now we’re at 98.1%, as far as vaccines in people’s arms or names associated with them, you know, are going to be immediately put into people’s arms,” Justice, a Republican, told “Face the. Nation “. in an interview Sunday. ‘We save all kinds of lives. We bring our children back to school. West Virginia is the diamond in the rough that many people have missed. ‘
Since the coronavirus vaccines developed by Pfizer and Moderna were first shipped to states in December, West Virginia has become a leader in vaccine distribution. According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), more than 205,000 doses of the shots have been distributed and more than 134,000 doses have been administered in the state.
Justice said West Virginia’s success is because “we are practical thinking people with a lot of really smart people getting it done.”
“A lot of governors were on their hands trying to figure out a system or a formula of what they were going to do. We weren’t on our hands. ‘We brought in our local pharmacies. We brought in our local health departments. We brought in our National Guard and we started shooting people in the arms because it’s all about age, age, age. ‘
Unlike other states, West Virginia refused to participate in a federal program whereby CFS and Walgreens administered vaccines to residents and staff of long-term care facilities and instead relied on local pharmacies to deliver the injections. It was then the first state in the nation to offer the vaccines to all nursing home facilities, before the end of 2020.
Justice said he decided to reject the federal partnership program because “there are so many people who depend on their local health departments, their local pharmacies.”
“If we’re going to create a bureaucracy with guidelines from the federal government and all, if we know this is about age, age and age, we have to get people in arms and every day we try to save a life in someone’s arm,” he said.
Across the country, 31.1 million doses of coronavirus vaccines have been distributed and 12.2 million doses administered. According to the CDC, more than 10.5 million people have received at least one dose of the shots.