CHARLESTON — West Virginia has so far administered almost 300,000 vaccines and the capacity is there to give 125,000 shots a week, if they were available.
“That is amazing,” Gov. Jim Justice said during his pandemic briefing Friday of the vaccine administration program. “We continue to lead the nation. We are the envy of the nation.”
Not only that, he said, more than 100,000 65 years old and older have received their first dose of the vaccine and more than 34,000 their second dose.
Justice also said more than 200,000 are now preregistered through the statewide Everbridge system, and that helps speed up the process and makes sure everyone who signs up gets an appointment when a dose is available to them.
But the number of doses coming into the state from the federal government remains an issue.
The state is expected to receive almost 30,000 doses next week, with more increases coming as production of both Pfizer and Moderna ramps up more.
“Other than just running up there and sitting on somebody, we are doing all we can (to get more vaccines),” he said. “We are going through every channel we can go through.”
The 30,000 is better, he added, “but nowhere close to where we want to be.”
Justice said Johnson & Johnson should have its one-dose vaccine approved by the FDA (Federal Drug Administration) soon and that will help, but the specific numbers of doses that may available has not yet known.
But he said he is still puzzled that so many vaccines in the country, about 20 million, have not been used and apparently stored somewhere.
“Other states have hundreds of thousands that are not in somebody’s arm,” he said. “Our vaccines mean something … ours save lives.”
Retired Maj. Gen. James Hoyer, director of the state Joint InterAgency Vaccine Task Force, said the state’s effort to have a vaccine clinic in all 55 counties is “going exceptionally well” and with the network in place, more vaccines can be handled.
“We are confident we can take a minimum of 125,000 doses a week right now and efficiently and effectively put them in arms,” he said. “We continue to improve each week but confident in the 55-county rollout.”
Getting vaccines in arms is a “race” with time, he said, to be ready for any of the COVID mutations (variants) that come into the state. They are more contagious.
So far, none has been detected in the state, but Virginia has seen several, including the South African variant.
Justice also said the COVID numbers continue to improve, reflecting trends across the nation.
As of Friday, the number of active cases had dropped to 17,761, a number that has dropped for 20 consecutive days.
The number of those in the hospital being treated for COVID also continues to drop, down to 384, less than half of the peak of 818 in early January.
Not only that, he said outbreaks in long-term care facilities have dropped to 49, with only three outbreaks in churches.
All of that is good news, but with a caveat.
“Stay the course,” he said of following protocol. “We still have a long ways to go.”
— Contact Charles Boothe at [email protected]
