According to provincial officials, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s claim is that he played no role in the early distribution of COVID-19 vaccines to an affluent community.
A Miami Herald an article published last Wednesday revealed that more than 1,200 residents of Key Largo’s affluent Ocean Reef Club community were vaccinated while doses were scarce in mid-January. During a Thursday press conference, DeSantis insisted that the clinic “was not a website we were involved in”, calling the article a “major failure” and a “poorly executed hit”.
Local officials from the country and a spokesman for Baptist Health Systems, the company that distributed the vaccine doses, contradicted the Republican governor’s denial in an article published by the Herald on Saturday.
“The true, when and how many vaccines that are shot into the arms of my constituents are first determined at the state level, wherever they are best used and best used, and are also awarded to our department of health, which is run by the state managed, and our emergency management, ”Mike Forster, commissioner of Monroe County, told the newspaper.
‘It’s our understanding that the Medical Center at Ocean Reef has asked the state of Florida to give vaccine doses, and the state of Florida Baptist Health has asked to record the doses in our ultra-cold freezer for delivery to the Medical Center in Ocean . Reef, ” Baptist Health Systems spokeswoman Dori A. Alvarez added in a statement. Herald and The Tallahassee Times.
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A spokesman for the Florida Emergency Management Division told the newspapers that neither he nor the Florida Department of Health had ordered Baptist Health Systems to distribute the doses. Since Monroe County officials also deny involvement and DeSantis claimed last week that the state was not “involved in any way, shape or form,” it is not clear who approved the distribution.
Residents of the Ocean Reef Club apparently included the only people from Key Largo who donated to DeSantis’ political committee, with 17 residents each giving more than $ 5,000 and as much as $ 250,000. Critics have also pointed to other early vaccination sites with apparent links to DeSantis donors, although in many other places no similar links appear to exist.
Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) Said DeSantis on Monday set up ‘only luxury community invitation clinics’, while accusing the governor of ‘retaliation or misrepresentation, or just lying flat’ when confronted. with criticism of the clinics, according to the South Florida Sun Sentinel. Rep. Charlie Crist (D-Fla.), Himself a former governor of GOP in Florida, said clinics have been set up “so that the governor’s friends and donors can ride in front of every other senior.”
Florida Commissioner for Agriculture and Consumer Services Nikki Fried, the state’s top Democratic official and a potential DeSantis 2022 governor, has called for a federal investigation into the governor. Fried said the distribution of vaccines in Florida was sent to “very exclusive zip codes”, while describing the process as “public corruption on his face” during a Monday appearance on MSNBC Oggend Joe.
Newsweek reached out to DeSantis’ office for comment.
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