Joe Biden admin to supply vaccine doses to pharmacies to boost inoculation drive

The US government on Tuesday announced that it would expand the ongoing vaccination programme to include select pharmacies across the country in order to provide more sites for people to get inoculated. According to President Joe Biden's government, the federal government will deliver vaccine shots to pharmacies starting February 11. White House COVID coordinator Jeff Zients said that 6,500 pharmacies will receive 1 million doses starting next week, which will further be expanded to include 40,000 pharmacies. 

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This will give the much-needed boost to the US vaccination drive, which President Joe Biden had promised to scale-up after assuming office. Biden had promised to vaccinate 100 million people in the first 100 days of his administration, and the move is being seen as a step towards it. Pharmacies in the United States have already been vaccinating for flu and have the infrastructure to carry out the COVID-19 vaccinations, Zients said while speaking at a press briefing. 

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Zients said that the vaccine doses would be distributed to pharmacies based on the population data of states. However, a priority will be given to vulnerable communities, whom the disease has hit the hardest. Zients also said that more doses will be sent to states in order to speed up the ongoing vaccination programme. The weekly vaccine doses that are directly sent to states will be increased by 5,00,000. 

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COVID-19 in the US

The United States remains the worst affected nation in the world with more than 26 million cases and over 4,43,000 deaths to date. The United States has administered over 32 million doses of vaccines so far, at a rate of 9.6 persons per 100 people. The country has become even more vulnerable ever since the detection of new variants, which has contributed to higher caseloads. The new variants have caused concerns among the scientific community over the effectiveness of vaccines against the mutations. The US government is reportedly involved with pharmaceutical firms in developing potential booster shots to increase the efficacy of existing vaccines. 

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(Image Credit: AP)