Nearly 1,000 missing UTEP virus vaccines now to arrive on Thursday

UPDATE, Jan. 20: A shipping snafu over the MLK holiday that left UTEP without an expected shipment of nearly 1,000 coronavirus vaccine doses has been resolved, officials said Wednesday, indicating the vaccinations were on their way and would be delivered soon.

“Some good news. We now have shipping confirmation for our first delivery of 975 doses of Covid-19 vaccine. Vaccines will arrive at UTEP on Thursday," the university said in an announcement.

That announcement continued as follows...

"We’ve decided to run the vaccination clinic Friday and Saturday to get our highest risk faculty, staff and students vaccinated without delay.

Those faculty, staff and students who were scheduled previously and who are at high risk will be sent an email directly to reschedule for Friday and Saturday.

We understand we weren’t the only location in Texas that had changes in vaccine arrival dates this week. We are going to keep participating in the vaccination program. Going forward, we won’t schedule people until we have confirmation from the shipper that vaccine is en route."

ORIGINAL REPORT, Jan. 19: EL PASO, Texas – UTEP has postponed the first of two vaccination events that was set to go Wednesday.

UTEP was expecting to receive 975 vaccines on Tuesday and scheduled its highest risk students, faculty and staff to start getting vaccinated on Wednesday and continuing through Thursday.

However, the Texas Department of State Health Services notified the university Tuesday that the vaccines would not be delivered on time.

“We do not know where the shipment is, but we have been told it is still scheduled to be allocated to UTEP,” said a statement issued by UTEP.

As a result, the university postponed Wednesday’s clinic. If vaccines arrive in time, they will continue as scheduled with the Thursday clinic.

All individuals who had appointments for Jan. 20 will be rescheduled, which officials said could be as early as Friday.