SPOKANE, Wash. — More appointments at the Spokane Arena’s mass vaccination clinic became available Tuesday at 5pm. But there are still not enough doses for everyone eligible in Spokane County to get one.
Washington’s Department of Health has been asking the federal government for more doses but cannot seem to get them. According to Lyndia Wilson with SRHD, DOH requested more than 350,000 doses of the vaccine and only received 100,000.
“We just do not have the vaccines in the state,” Wilson said. “A third of our primary orders were filled this week.”
Across the state there are 1,000 health care providers enrolled with the state and ready to vaccinate, but because there is such a shortage of doses coming from the feds, only 200 of those providers actually got vaccines this week.
“What we are struggling with is the instability of getting our doses week to week,” Wilson said. “The good news in all of this is we can expect in March the vaccine distribution to improve.”
Wilson believes that with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine expected to be approved by the end of the month, along with pharmacies across the country preparing to vaccinate, the vaccine rollout will be much smoother next month.
