OKLAHOMA CITY — The Department of Health refuses to say how it will distribute the initial 30,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses the state is slated to receive next week, even as questions mount over how health officials will prioritize which hospitals receive the first available injections.
With the first vaccine doses expected to arrive as early as Wednesday, anticipation is building, particularly among the 84,000 front-line health workers who have faced some of the highest risk while treating the sickest Oklahomans.
But some observers note that the state Department of Health has been mum — perhaps understandably — on how exactly it will prioritize which workers and hospitals get first access to the vaccines.
In all, an estimated 157,900 Oklahomans — including 11,400 paramedic and EMTs, 62,000 long-term care residents and staff and 500 public health employees — are supposed to be the first group eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine.
State Rep. Marcus McEntire, R-Duncan, who most recently chaired the state House’s health appropriations and budget committee, said the state Department of Health is keeping the granular details of its vaccination distribution plan under wraps.
“Keeping it close to the vest is probably the only way they can have continuity in their plans,” McEntire said. “If they release the really granular plan, then everybody would nitpick it to death. (They) would try to pivot, and that causes ripple effects. It’s probably the security of their strategy.”
While he’d like to see a more granular distribution plan, McEntire said those have not yet been offered. He assumes the Health Department will focus its initial distribution in the metropolitan areas, which are treating the sickest COVID-19 patients, though there’s a need for vaccine relief everywhere.
On Friday, Keith Reed, a Health Department deputy commissioner, said the initial 33,150 Pfizer vaccines expected to arrive Wednesday will go straight to front-line health care workers.
When the second shipment of 38,000 Pfizer doses arrives Dec. 23, Reed said about 27,000 of those will be sent to CVS and Walgreens as part of a partnership with pharmacies to begin vaccinating tens of thousands of residents and staff in long-term care centers.
He said ultimately the state is expecting as many as 166,550 first-time doses by the end of the year.
That includes 66,200 doses of the Moderna vaccine expected to arrive Dec. 23. Another 29,200 Moderna doses also are expected Dec. 30.
The Moderna vaccine has yet to receive federal emergency approval required for use, though health experts expect that in the coming days.
The initial shipment of the vaccine will go to the “significant” medical facilities around the state, while ensuing shipments will be distributed to another echelon of hospitals to ensure good coverage around Oklahoma, Reed said.
“(The plan) is detailed, and they do have the exact number that they’re shipping to different places,” said Dr. Lance Frye, the interim commissioner of health.
State health officials, though, wouldn’t discuss how they plan to prioritize distribution to the state’s hospital systems, refusing to provide the amounts each facility will receive or counts by region despite several requests.
“For the purposes of security, OSDH is not publicly announcing where the prepositioned vaccine with be stored or how many each facility will receive,” the agency said in a statement. “As the vaccine is distributed across county health department networks, the local jurisdictions will be contacting specific organizations in the phase one priority groups to begin scheduling clinics, and public announcements and web-based vaccine finder locations will become available.”
LaWanna Halstead, with the state Hospital Association, said initial vaccine distribution is expected to be concentrated on hospitals in the larger population areas to ensure maximum distribution and for logistical reasons.
“It will start to move out to the more outlying areas,” she said. “That’s all being controlled by the county health departments that have been working with the hospitals in their areas to determine how they will do that.”
She said a lot of the more rural areas don’t have the adequate types of storage required to store the Pfizer vaccine, which has stringent requirements on how long it can be kept outside a freezer before use.
“It’s kind of a logistical chess match,” Halstead said. “I do think the Health Department has done a very good job thinking about all the logistical aspects of it.”
Because there will be limited doses, Halstead said the hospital workers working with the sickest patients are slated to get first access, followed by those who work with the next sickest and so on.
She said she understands why the Health Department is keeping the distribution amounts, locations and exact time frames “close to their chest.”
“I just don’t think we really know what the public reaction is going to be to all this,” she said.
Dr. Mary Clarke, president-elect of the Oklahoma State Medical Association and a Stillwater physician, said she never expected there would be enough vaccines for every front-line health care worker to get one during the first shipment.
“I thought that was probably a little pie in the sky,” she said. “It think trying to get as many first-line workers at least one dose is important, and that booster is going to be very important.”
She said adequately protecting health care workers is going to depend on whether the state gets the required second vaccine booster needed to complement the first.
“I do know that in our facility, our physicians can’t wait for the vaccine,” she said. “We all want to get it out and get it done.”
Clarke said health officials are trying to keep quiet about specific dose numbers and locations.
“I would imagine there are lots of people who might do some crazy things if they know that there are 40,000 vaccine doses in one spot,” she said. “We have a lot of emotions running high.”
However, Clarke said Oklahomans are watching the vaccine distribution process closely. A lack of transparency from state health officials regarding total doses distributed to each region is not a good thing.
“I think they would do better to make that more transparent,” Clarke said. “I think people would be a little more confident. Transparency helps build more confidence in your system. When you start to withhold information, people start to become suspicious. Emotions are running high over this. Anything we can do to eliminate some of the stressors … can be helpful in the long run.”
Janelle Stecklein covers the Oklahoma Statehouse for CNHI’s newspapers and websites. Reach her at [email protected].
