Ohio To Receive Fewer COVID-19 Vaccines Than Previously Estimated

COLUMBUS, OH — Ohio will receive 50,000 fewer COVID-19 vaccine doses next week than previously estimated, state officials confirmed.

"Ohio is receiving our first full week of vaccine that was promised by Pfizer. However, the allocation for the second Pfizer shipment was lower than previously estimated by our federal partners," a spokesperson for the Ohio Department of Health told Patch on Friday morning.

Officials originally estimated they would receive 123,000 doses in the second Pfizer shipment. The current allocation is 70,200 doses, the state health department said.

Gov. Mike DeWine originally estimated Ohio would receive approximately 420,000 COVID-19 vaccines by Christmas.

"We still expect to receive about 510,000 doses total through December," the Ohio Department of Health spokesperson said. "CDC / Operation Warp Speed did not provide a clear reason for the lower allocation of Pfizer," they added.

In a news release issued Thursday, Pfizer officials said the decrease is not due to an issue on the part of Pfizer.

"Pfizer has not had any production issues with our COVID-19 vaccine, and no shipments containing the vaccine are on hold or delayed," a company spokesperson said. "This week, we successfully shipped all 2.9 million doses that we were asked to ship by the U.S. Government to the locations specified to them. We have millions more doses sitting in our warehouse but, as of now, we have not received any shipment instructions for additional doses."

Other states around the nation are also seeing reductions in how many COVID-19 vaccine doses they will receive. Washington Gov. Jay Inslee said his state's allocation was cut by 40 percent. Michigan's allocation was cut by 24,000 doses.

Pfizer's first shipment of COVID-19 vaccines arrived at hospitals in Columbus and Cincinnati on Monday, before being sent to hospitals in Cleveland and around the state on Tuesday.

The state released the following list of groups that should be among the first Ohioans vaccinated against COVID-19:

• Home health workers
• Hospice workers
• Emergency medical services responders
• Primary care practitioners
• Free-standing emergency department, urgent care, pharmacy, and dialysis center providers not vaccinated by hospitals or healthcare systems
• Dental providers
• Public health employees who are at risk of exposure or transmission, such as vaccinators
• Mobile unit practitioners
• Federally-qualified health center providers
• High-risk ancillary health care staff members