Kansas to get 90,000 COVID vaccine doses next week as feds double their distribution
The federal government will accelerate its distribution of COVID-19 vaccine next week, doubling the doses in Kansas to about 90,000, Gov. Laura Kelly announced Friday.
“I spoke with the Biden administration on Tuesday. And I was told that we would be receiving close to 90,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine next week,” said Kelly, who, like Biden, is a Democrat. “That’s double what we had been seeing just three weeks ago.
“We are continuing to urge the federal government to increase the number of vaccines we receive and they are actually doing so.”
This week President Joe Biden announced major deals with vaccine developers Pfizer and Moderna to buy 200 million more vaccine doses — 100 million from each company — in a move meant to speed up vaccinations nationwide.
And White House coronavirus adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci said April could be “open season” when any American can get vaccinated regardless of where they might be on any priority list.
Information about how many doses Missouri health officials expect to receive next week was unavailable from state health officials early Friday afternoon.
But at a briefing earlier this week they also spoke of more vaccine coming, saying that Missouri should receive a large shipment in March of the new Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which is expected to receive federal emergency authorization later this month.
Dr. Randall Williams, director of the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, said he was briefed this week by federal Operation Warp Speed officials, but didn’t say how much of the new single-dose vaccine Missouri expects to receive initially.
At this point, demand for the vaccine nationwide far exceeds supplies, leaving people frustrated and angry. Vaccinators stand at the ready, but there’s little vaccine.
This was the first week for pharmacies in Kansas and Missouri registered with the Federal Retail Pharmacy Program to begin receiving doses directly from the federal government.
A small number of Balls Food pharmacies on the Kansas side of the metro will begin vaccinations on Monday, according to ballsfoodspharmacy.com, where people can sign up.
For information about local Walmarts that have vaccine, go to walmart.com.
In Missouri, 81 Walmarts and Sam’s Club locations were set to begin vaccinations Friday, according to the state health department.
In addition, 21 independent Health Mart pharmacies will also distribute vaccines soon, officials said. The 102 pharmacies are scheduled to receive more than 18,000 doses per week through the program, health officials said.
Kelly said 82 pharmacies in 32 Kansas counties were expected to receive about 10,000 doses initially.
That’s in addition to vaccines being given through local health departments and hospitals.
As of Friday morning, the state’s COVID-19 dashboard at kansasvaccine.gov/158/Data showed that about 250,000 Kansans, or 8.5% of the state’s population, had received at least one vaccine dose.
While data for this week is still being compiled, the state’s dashboard showed an increase in the rate of vaccine distribution in recent weeks.
As of Friday afternoon, the dashboard showed more than 73,000 doses were administered between Feb. 1 and 5. By comparison, about 41,000 doses were given between Jan. 18 and 22.
In Missouri, the state’s vaccine dashboard — at covidvaccine.mo.gov/data — showed Friday that 801,456 residents, or 9.7% of the state’s population, had received at least one dose — 206,088 of them have received two doses.
Over the last seven days, 152,184 doses have been administered.
This story was originally published February 12, 2021 at 3:26 PM.
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