NYC Down To 30K Coronavirus Vaccine Doses, Will Run Out: Mayor

New York City NY

17 February, 2021

11:29 AM

Description

NEW YORK CITY — Severe winter weather sweeping the nation will delay shipments of coronavirus vaccine to New York City, where only 30,000 doses remain on hand, Mayor Bill de Blasio said. "That means we're going to run out today, tomorrow — we're going to run out of what we have now," he said Wednesday. De Blasio said as many as 35,000 vaccination appointments might not be scheduled. Frustrations from de Blasio over the city's long-meager COVID-19 supply have been a recurrent theme in his daily briefings. The city has the capacity to perform 500,000 vaccinations a week, yet only receives a fraction of that from its federal- and state-controlled allotment. De Blasio has continually pressed for more local control — "freedom to vaccinate" in his words — over how the city doles out doses. He went further Wednesday, pressing for a direct allocation to the city that bypasses the state altogether. "The federal allocation to New York City is indirect because it still has to require approvals from the state of New York," he said. "That's slowing things down in many ways. We need direct allocation New York City, meaning direct supply and no strings attached." Roughly 20 percent of doses distributed in the city also go to non-residents. De Blasio said he doesn't begrudge non-city dwellers getting the vaccine, but argued that the city's allocation should be increased to reflect it. But whether de Blasio's proposals gain any traction is an open question. For now, the city has to contend with delays in vaccine shipments because of winter storms across the country, he said. The city has so far administered 1,365,956 doses of COVID-19 vaccines. That's the population of Dallas, Texas — a place with more snow currently than New York City, de Blasio wryly noted.