How many COVID vaccinations can Florida perform per day?
Bottom Line: In the grand scheme of issues which shouldn’t be politized this has to be near the top of the list. Yet a week ago Monday the political salvos were fired by the Biden administration when they were asked about Governor DeSantis’s plea for an increase in the planned vaccine doses set to ship to Florida for the week. The disingenuous response by the Biden administration, that Florida had only distributed half of what they’d been allocated was exactly false. In fact, Florida had and has been using all of its first doses about as quickly as we’ve been receiving them. That’s because we have far more capacity than supply for first doses. The vaccines on hand are second doses already allocated to those due to receive them as they become eligible after waiting the necessary length of time. Aside from what's played out in news media, very little has been done to address what Florida’s capable of delivering.
Florida’s peak day for total vaccinations occurred on January 22nd when 103,409 vaccinations took place statewide. That included greater than 96,000 first does and nearly 7,400 second doses. Florida’s not had more than 56,000 first doses in a day to distribute since. In fact, by Sunday, the state had its entire first dose supply exhausted as only 1,194 first doses were administered. The lowest daily total since the statewide rollout. That included a paltry 31 first dose vaccinations in Palm Beach County, 70 in Broward and 831 in Miami-Dade. So, what’s possible?
It’s a moving target to attempt to gauge the exact capacity for vaccinations in Florida, however based on FDOH info it appears to be approximately 250,000 per day. Florida has 1.7 million residents who’ve had at least a first dose of vaccine. That leaves around 20 million Floridians who haven’t been vaccinated. If Florida had the supply of first doses equal to the estimated current capacity, we could have every Floridian vaccinated in 80 days. Based on current guidance from the Florida Department of Health it appears 31% of Floridians eligible are opting not to accept the vaccine. That leaves only about 13.2 million Floridians who need to be vaccinated. Florida’s current capacity would allow for every Floridian who currently wants a vaccine to have one in 53 days, or in late March. Instead, our current pace leaves us tracking towards August before that happens.
I don’t think Florida’s not receiving more vaccines due to political considerations, however it’s crystal clear that we have capacity that dwarfs the vaccines we have available. There are two sides to stories and one side to facts. These are the facts.
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