COVID-19 Vaccine Rollout Failure

by Zaid Aleem

According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the United States has administered about 16.5 million doses up until January 20, 2021, out of a total of 36.5 million vaccines distributed.  This includes over 14 million people who have received one or more doses and roughly 2.1 million people who have received two doses. 

While the numbers seem to be large, the reality is that the vaccination process has started off painfully slow, indicating signs that the country is repeating the same mistakes it made with coronavirus tests and protective equipment for health care workers. 

According to Vox, former president Donald Trump’s administration had projected 20 million people would be vaccinated by the end of December 2020. More than twenty days into January, we are yet to reach this goal. Although some challenges with a big vaccine rollout were expected, experts say the U.S.’s problems were predictable and preventable.

“Personally, I’m incredibly frustrated,” Brown University School of Public Health dean Ashish Jha tweeted. “Did we not know that vaccines were coming? Is vaccine administration a surprise?”

With the new administration now taking over, President Joe Biden has an ambitious plan to distribute 100 million vaccine doses in 100 days. This implies a million vaccine doses a day, up from the current 447,000 doses per day. Biden’s goal of more than doubling this rate can be achieved if the United States implements a vaccination campaign that treats Covid-19 more like an act of bioterrorism and less like the seasonal flu. Although the United States does not actually have enough vaccine to inoculate all 331 million Americans, availability is far from the only barrier to ending the pandemic. Out of the 36 million doses distributed to states so far, only 46% have been given.

Amazon has reached out to Biden to offer logistical and technical support for his goal of vaccinating 100 million Americans within his first 100 days in office. With a  company of Amazon’s nature and expertise in terms of logistics, the distribution of vaccines should greatly improve.