More than 2.1 million Americans have received the first dose of COVID-19 vaccine, but the US will miss the target of vaccinating 20 million people by 2020.
- CDC data reveal that 2,127,143 first-dose coronavirus vaccines were administered from both Pfizer and Moderna
- Nearly 11.5 million doses were sent cumulatively to all 50 countries
- U.S. officials have promised for months to vaccinate 20 million Americans by the end of the year
- Another 4.7 million doses will be sent to states this week, which means that a total of 15.5 million doses will be distributed by the end of the year, but will not be administered.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said the U.S. on Monday morning 2127 143 administered first doses of COVID-19 vaccines in the country and distributed 11 445 175 doses.
The agency said the number of vaccine doses distributed and the number of people receiving the first dose were for both Moderna and Pfizer / BioNTech, COVID-19 vaccines Monday.
According to the count published on December 26, the agency administered 1,944,585 first vaccine doses and distributed 9,547,925 doses.
Thus, within two days, another 182,558 doses were dispensed.
Most of these early doses were administered to health care workers, although some countries have vaccinated elderly Americans living in nursing homes or other long-term care facilities.
US Tsar Admiral Brett Giroir, who is testing the coronavirus, says any American who wants to be vaccinated will be able to do so by June.
Vaccines have been developed in record time, but they cannot be spread fast enough, as COVID-19 hospitalizations have remained in the US for almost the entire month of December, with the death toll above 334,000.
More than 2.1 million health workers and nursing home residents received their first doses of COVID-19 vaccines on Monday morning, CDC data show
The CDC has not yet released a state-by-state breakdown of vaccine distribution or injections, and only a handful of individual states have published their own scores.
Operation Warp Speed maintained that it could vaccinate 20 million of the most dangerous Americans by the end of the week. Officials never made it clear whether 20 million people would receive only their first or both doses by the end of the year.
Admiral Brett Giroir, US coronavirus test tsar, insisted that the amount of two million is an underestimation, but admitted that the operation is not suitable for vaccinating ten times as many people as in the next three days as have not been vaccinated.
‘The figure of two million is probably an underestimation. “We have distributed 10.8 million doses to the states,” Admiral Giroir told Good Morning America on Monday.
‘The number of two million is delayed for three to seven days. We certainly expect it to be a multiple of two million.
‘We are going to distribute another 4.7 million this week, so by the end of this week in the hands of the states [will be] more than 15.5 million doses. ‘
Both Moderna and Pfizer vaccines should be administered in two doses. Moderna’s are given 28 days after the first, and Pfizer’s are given 21 days later.
Each vaccine has been developed at record speed and put into mass production – but they are plagued by logistical whispers.
In the first of the launch of Pfizer’s vaccine, Operation Warp Speed officials claimed that Pfizer was struggling to achieve its production targets, while Pfizer denied any production issues and instead blamed the government’s allocation process.
Dozens of countries have said their awards have been slashed. Operation Warp Speed said the allocation numbers estimates are subject to change, not exact promises.
The CDC score is the first consolidated look at how many shots were actually given, but it will inevitably lag behind the actual number of vaccinations as cities, provinces and states bring their own tracking systems online and report to the national agency.
Of the few available state panels, the run-up is slow.
Idaho was one of the first states to post its dashboard, reporting that 10,459 doses were administered.
About 140,000 frontline workers and nursing home residents have been vaccinated in New York, receiving one of the largest initial awards in the United States.