As our country continues giving coronavirus vaccines, some problems are becoming very evident in our handling of this process. The entire U.S. is reporting shortages, and we are struggling to distribute the vaccine that we do have in stock. These issues of manufacturing and distribution have many layers. For one, the country has not had to deal with this before, on this scale. Our public health is underfunded, overwhelmed, and disjointed. The vaccine supply is uncertain and finite, but the distribution has proven to also be chaotic, as support for the vaccine still wavers, and certain states set too many limits and restrictions.
One state that has shown this chaos is New York. The state had continuously discarded precious doses of the vaccine, after struggling to find people that could jump through all the hoops of their restrictions. The state has since loosened these strict rules and have allowed a much larger range of people to get this vaccine. This chain of events has occurred in other states as well, as even liberal leaders (who had emphasized COVID-19 restrictions more than their Republican counterparts), struggle to lead. This extreme emphasis on getting vaccinations out to the most vulnerable first can prove to be wasteful and inefficient, if done wrong.
As disappointing as the COVID-19 response and vaccination process might seem in the U.S., poorer nations may not receive the vaccine until 2023. Parts of Europe have also shared the U.S.’s pattern of disorganization. Canada even lags behind us. While some nations such as the U.K. soar ahead in their vaccination progress, it is important to keep in mind that the whole world is struggling with this, to some extent, in some way.
Keep up with CIMA Law Group’s blog, as we post several times a week.
CIMA Law Group Blog 