NY Nursing Home Coronavirus Vaccinations Will Get State Boost

New York City NY

04 January, 2021

3:08 PM

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NEW YORK CITY — A federal program to get nursing home residents COVID-19 vaccines is running too slowly so the state will step in, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said. The expedited program will get 85 percent of nursing home residents in state their first vaccine doses by the end of this week, Cuomo said Monday. "The goal is over the next two weeks that all the nursing home residents: vaccinated," he said. Nursing home COVID-19 vaccinations were handled by a federal program that used Walgreens and CVS pharmacies to get handle the shots. But Cuomo — as he did for hospital-run vaccination programs in his Monday briefing— critiqued the program's pace. Out of 611 nursing homes across the state, about 288 have completed their first round of shots, Cuomo said. "That has not been going as quickly as we would have liked," he said. "New York is now going to step in and actually expedite the federal program in nursing homes."