Lawmakers involved over second doses, ‘vaccine tourism’

Despite a chaotic rollout plagued by busy telephone linesFlorida surgeon general Scott Rivkees told a Senate commission last week that “the vaccine is our way forward” when it comes to fighting COVID-19.

With an unpredictable number of doses coming into the state from week to week and pent-up demand for the vaccine, it’s going to be a rocky road, officials who spoke to state lawmakers last week admitted.

“The Ministry of Health’s plan calls for a decentralized effort,” said Jared Moskowitz, director of emergency management. “I know it seems messy, but public health is a decentralized effort.”

Over 1,200 vaccine providers – hospitals, county health departments, pharmacies – are ready to put shots in the arms of hundreds of thousands of people who will call for them as soon as the federal government delivers them, Moskowitz said.

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And the state is developing its own registration system to be rolled out in the coming weeks hopefully to eliminate the problems that occurred in the first few weeks of registration.

But the federal government is only leaving the state for six days, and weekly shipments have shrunk instead of increasing as originally expected.

“It’s not that we can’t open locations,” he said. “The thing is, we can’t feed locations.”

Last week marked the first time a legislature met publicly to tackle the pandemic that has infected more than 1.5 million people in Florida, hospitalized nearly 70,000 and killed more than 24,000 people.

It was also the first public comment in months from Rivkees, also the secretary of the state’s Department of Health. It was the first chance lawmakers had to ask him about the state’s handling of the pandemic and the launch of a vaccine that has been heralded as the country’s greatest tool to fight the deadly respiratory disease, which is enjoying an alarming resurgence across the country Has.

Second doses are of the utmost importance

The availability of secondary doses was a major concern of lawmakers, repeating the questions their constituents have been asking for weeks.

Other previously unknown information is whether the vaccine will be effective against a new mutated variant of the COVID virus, why snowbirds and others from abroad are being vaccinated here and what is being done to repair the registration system.

At the same time, all indicators show that the disease is spreading.

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A report from the White House COVID-19 Task Force shows Florida is back in full swing along with most of the rest of the country. Hospital stays and deaths are likely to increase further in the coming weeks, the report said.

On the upside, over 1 million people were vaccinated with at least one dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine over the weekend, with nearly 100,000 completing the two-dose therapy.

“We continue to focus on vaccinating the state’s 4.5 million residents aged 65 and over,” Rivkees told lawmakers.

People panicked when Donald Trump’s administration on Tuesday told states not to withhold second doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccine. While both vaccines are moderately effective after a dose, both require a booster shot three to four weeks after the first shot to be fully effective.

The state advised hospitals and health departments in the county not to withhold doses received to ensure that as many people as possible received their first dose of vaccine. But on Friday news outlets reported that the Trump administration had completely run through the reserve reserved for second cans.

Last week, Moskowitz told a house committee convened to look into the state’s response to the pandemic that the state was ready to fire shots once the cans were released by the federal government.

It didn’t help when national news outlets reported on Friday that the supply reserved for second cans had been used up.

“Epic Fail!” Moskowitz tweeted when the news came that the Trump administration had used up the cans reserved for seconds. “This is government wrongdoing and life is at stake! Explain this to my seniors! “

From Saturday evening he was still expecting a delivery of second cans this week. “We are getting second cans so far,” said Moskowitz in an email to the USA TODAY NETWORK – FLORIDA.

“We couldn’t create trust …”

Speaking to a panel of state lawmakers last week, Moskowitz said he had no information to guarantee production would keep up to deliver second shots. This uncertainty has led hospitals to hold back supplies to ensure they have enough for the second round of dosing in case the government falls short.

“When they asked us when they were going to get their second dose, we couldn’t tell them,” said Moskowitz. “We couldn’t trust the hospital system that they would be given a second dose because we weren’t told the date of delivery.”

The hospital had 234,000 unused cans last week, he said, but those are initial shots intended to go into the arms. “Hospitals believed they had an obligation to hold on to those second doses,” added Moskowitz.

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As per federal guidelines, Governor Ron DeSantis ordered hospitals and other vaccine providers to use up their entire allocation for the first doses, with the confidence that more would come for the second doses.

“While the federal government talks about how to distribute vaccine doses and whether to withhold booster vaccinations, Florida is committed to the two-dose regimen for both Pfizer and Moderna vaccines,” DeSantis said in a press release last week . “Florida wants all seniors to get booster vaccinations at the right time.”

The federal government has told the state that Florida will receive 266,100 cans for first shots and 506,300 cans for second shots this week, said Cody McCloud, a spokesman for the governor’s office.

How many Floridians received one or both doses of the COVID-19 vaccine? We have the numbers.

Rivkees responded to news of a new, faster-spreading variant of the COVID-19 virus that is common in the United States, first discovered in the UK in October, B117. It was discovered in Florida just before the New Year and accounts for less than ⅓ percent of cases in the United States

“It is being targeted by current vaccines and so we continue our mitigation strategies and remain vigilant,” Rivkees told lawmakers.

Florida has 46 and California has 40 of the 122 cases of B117 in the US, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC on Friday predicted that this new variant will be the predominant strain in the US by March, which will be another strain on hospitals and require greater public health action.

Snowbirds that the residents get out of the way?

Connie Dabel, who lives in Panama City Beach, blames people up north for their inability to get an appointment for a vaccine.

“They come here to get their vaccine, which makes it impossible to get an appointment for residents to get a vaccine,” said the 65-year-old Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease told USA TODAY NETWORK – FLORIDA in an email.

Snowbirds rent or own houses and stay and pay taxes for months, Moskowitz said. “They contribute to the economy and when they get sick they end up in our hospitals,” he said.

Moskowitz took a stronger stance on vaccine tourism: “It’s not allowed. It’s hideous, ”said Moskowitz. “People shouldn’t fly in to get a shot and get out.”

The vaccine is a federal resource that is allocated to each state based on population, Rivkees said. However, there is no federal guidance on who they cannot give it to: “We distribute it without restrictions,” Rivkees said.

State records show 97% of those vaccinated are Florida residents, Rivkees said. “We have health workers from other states who are receiving the vaccine,” he added.

State Senator Lauren Book, D-Plantation, asked if any federal regulations would prevent local governments from placing restrictions on who could get the county allocation of the vaccine. Rivkees said he had to look into that, but people can travel to a neighboring county to get the vaccine if it’s not available in their home country.

There have also been isolated reports of people who have traveled from other countries to be vaccinated. “If we are aware of something, we will do something about it,” said Rivkees.

Vickie Freeman, 69, from Naples said she was being sidelined because of the snowbirds.

“I tried to secure a ticket for the three events in Naples, but they all sold out within minutes,” said Freeman in an email to the USA TODAY NETWORK – FLORIDA. “I’ve learned that visitors or people from other counties can push me.”

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For places like Naples, Panama City and other coastal communities, this is the peak tourist and snowbird season, she said, when snowbirds fill the state’s streets, shopping malls and medical appointments, she said.

The states these snowbirds and other visitors came from have received vaccine grants based on the state’s population, she said.

“I understand the economic value that snowbirds bring to southwest Florida. But I’ll be at the bottom of the list, ”she said. “Why should the Florida allotment be reduced by residents of other states?”

Contact Jeff Schweers at jschweers@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter @jeffschweers.

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