PA’s vaccine roll-out mess

To the Editor,

Pennsylvania is lagging in the roll-out of the COVID-19 vaccines. Depending upon which week you look at and which metric you use, our state ranks between 39th and 44th in the nation in number of people vaccinated. While one might think this is because our state has been starved for supply, this simply isn’t true. According to a published NPR report on March 21, the state has received 6,257,455 doses. 

The problem lies in another statistic cited in that report – distribution efficiency. Only 74% of the doses received have been injected into people’s arms, again significantly lagging the national average. Yet our officials still haven’t given the Philadelphia suburbs their fair share of the doses, nor have they opened mass vaccination sites, nor accepted pleas from our excellent hospital and medical networks to help distribute the vaccines (as noted in a recent PennMedicine communication to patients).

Is our state leadership deliberately trying to prolong the pandemic? Or are they simply inept?

By contrast, our neighbor New Jersey is at an impressive 85% in distribution efficiency, perhaps due to their use of mass vaccination sites staffed by the National Guard. Our leaders should give the highest priority to improving our distribution methods as the quantities and types of vaccines grow.

Steve Karlovic
Rose Valley