When Will CA's Coronavirus Vaccine Supply Improve?

CALIFORNIA — Gov. Gavin Newsom continued his tour of California's vaccine clinics this week, and at each stop, he lamented the same issue: supply. A major dosage deficit still plagues the state's efforts, even with all the improvements made to California's vaccine rollout.

So when will California's vaccine supply improve? Newsom hinted Monday that things may start to turn around in April.

If the federal government grants emergency authorization for Johnson & Johnson's vaccine product this week, its presence could be a game changer for the Golden State, Newsom said Monday morning at the Long Beach Convention Center vaccination site.

"I’m very confident with [Johnson & Johnson], at the end of March, April, we’re going to start seeing things really ramp up," Newsom said. "May, June, July: game changer. All of a sudden we're at a completely different level."

The Food and Drug Administration will meet Thursday to discuss the use of Johnson & Johnson's Janssen Biotech Inc. vaccine. The Pfizer and Moderna products were approved just one day after their advisory committee meetings, according to Bay News 9.

Johnson & Johnson said it would be able to provide 20 million doses of its single-shot vaccine to the United States by the end of March if it gets the green light from the federal government.

Until then, Newsom warned that supply will remain limited even as the state receives more vaccines from the federal government each week. "At the end of the day, there just aren't enough Pfizer vaccines; there aren't enough Moderna vaccines," Newsom said at a different vaccination center Sunday.

Newsom began his day Monday in Long Beach, a city he's repeatedly given a gold star for its vaccine rollout.

"So I ask people — mindful again of being optimistic but not overly optimistic — that over the course of the next number of weeks, we're still going to be in a constrained supply environment," he said. "But over the course of the next few months, you're going to see throughput and opportunity to expand these tiers and expand availability and access."

Around 1.4 million vaccines were administered over the last week, just shy of 200,000 doses administered each day, Newsom said Monday. Last week, the state received 1.3 million vaccine doses, and the state looks to get about 1.4 million next week.

Officials warned that a challenging month lies ahead for the state's already affected appointment system. The increased amount of doses arrives as counties prepare to widen eligibility for essential workers such as teachers, food service workers and law enforcement.

In mid-March, everyone 16 and older with a serious underlying health condition will also join the list.

And to complicate matters, over the weekend, shipments carrying about 702,000 vaccine doses were stalled by a winter storm to the east, Newsom said Friday. Some 6 million U.S. doses were delayed by the massive storm, but the White House said it expected to catch up on these deliveries by midweek.

Hundreds if not thousands of appointments were rescheduled in California over the weekend, and some vaccination centers faced closure, including all six city-run clinics in Los Angeles.

To combat some of these obstacles, California's new vaccine delivery system, managed by Blue Shield, was rolled out in some counties Sunday. Newsom hopes that the state's new centralized system of tracking, scheduling and delivering doses will smooth the state's embattled vaccine rollout.

The new system launched Sunday in Riverside, Kings, Imperial, Madera, Merced, San Joaquin, Stanislaus, Fresno and Kern counties.

Newsom continued to push for schools to reopen, touting Long Beach as a "demonstrable leader" in vaccination efforts, particularly for inoculating teachers.

The Golden State will set aside 10 percent of its weekly vaccine allotment for teachers, school staff and child care providers beginning March 1.

"It's foundational in terms of getting this economy open," Newsom said. "If you care about women, you care about moms, particularly single mothers, there's nothing ... more important we can do to support working women and single moms in particular than getting our youngest kids back into school in cohorts where we can do it safely."

State coronavirus cases are falling rapidly each week despite obstacles in the form of a vaccine shortage and the emergence of variants in the state, state data showed. The state reported a seven-day 3 percent positivity rate on Monday — a third of what it was a month ago (8.9 percent), Newsom said. There were 4,664 newly reported cases Sunday, and a total of 7,437,925 vaccines have been administered to date.

"We are making progress," Newsom said. "There's not just light at the end of the tunnel. There's a bright light at the end of the tunnel"

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Read more about coronavirus and vaccines in California from Patch:

• COVID In LA: Newsom Visits Vaccine Sites, Delayed Doses En Route
  
• Vaccine Rollout: CA To Reserve 10% Of Doses For Teachers
  
• 5 CA Variant, Vaccine Questions: What You Need To Know
  
• LA's New Coronavirus Vaccine Site Opens Amid Dosage Deficit
  
• CA Detects First Cases Of South African Coronavirus Variant