El Paso sees increase in vaccine allocation despite J&J pause
EL PASO, Texas -- El Paso is receiving more than 2,000 vaccines this week than the previous week despite a federal and state pause on the one-shot Johnson and Johnson vaccine.
The El Paso area is receiving more vaccines even though a far fewer number of additional providers are getting shipped doses. Last week, 28 providers got shipments. This week, only 12 providers received shipments, and an interesting thing to note is that one additional provider is receiving more vaccines than the major hub providers in El Paso.
The additional provider is the regional headquarters for the state health department. This week they are receiving 10,710 vaccines. That is 700 more than the site at George Perry run by the city of El Paso, and almost 5,000 more than the site at the El Paso Coliseum run by El Paso county.
The site run by the state health department had received vaccines only four other weeks during the rollout. In those four weeks, the site had been shipped 2,870 vaccines.
ABC-7 spoke with one of the workers inside the facility and were told that the vaccines shipped are never administered there. They are only stored to be used at other facilities later around El Paso later on. The state health department directs that facility on when and where to send those vaccines.
Last week during a city news conference, El Paso Fire Chief Mario D'Agostino said the city can administer way more vaccines than they are getting.
"It just really depends on when they talk about a push. If you listen to the federal government and from what our federal and state partners have said, 'We're looking to see some increases in the next few weeks.' We've heard that since January. We still have not seen it," D'Agostino said.
