Name: Tony Evers calls failed promise for more vaccine from feds 'a slap in the face'
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Tony Evers calls failed promise for more vaccine from feds 'a slap in the face'

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You are the owner of this article.You have permission to edit this article.Gov. Tony Evers’ administration and legislative Republicans Friday ended a week of finger pointing over the state’s sluggish vaccine rollout as a promised federal increase in vaccine supply evaporated.Only days ago, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar and Vice President Mike Pence told governors the federal government would release vaccine doses held in reserve for second shots, required to complete the vaccination protocol, and dole them out to states.But on Friday, the reported that federal officials had begun shipping those reserve doses at the end of December, to boost shipments to the states."It was a slap in the face to the people of Wisconsin," Evers said. "Frankly, I have no idea why they made that claim when they knew it wasn’t" accurate.The revelation comes as legislative Republicans continue to hammer the Evers administration for not doing more to get people vaccinated quickly, with Assembly Speaker Robin Vos this week calling Wisconsin’s effort “an embarrassment” and several GOP lawmakers criticizing the governor for what they say is an excessively bureaucratic system for deciding who gets the vaccine first.A&nbsp;&nbsp;ranking put Wisconsin 35th among states in the percentage of vaccines administered.&nbsp;But Evers administration officials say their hands are tied by tight supplies.Department of Health Services Deputy Secretary Julie Willems Van Dijk said that if the state were to achieve the goal of 80% herd immunity in six months, it would need 1.4 million doses a month, three times its current allocation.&nbsp;If the state were to open vaccinations to a wider group, she said, "we would just be crushed by people who want vaccine and not have enough."&nbsp;&nbsp;State officials say determining priority groups for the vaccine is a necessary step because of the high demand and limited supply. They say the process is not holding back the vaccine rollout because the first group slated to get the vaccine, the so-called 1a group that includes frontline health care workers and nursing home residents and staff, is nowhere near complete.&nbsp;Details on the next phase of the rollout are expected next week.Evers and health officials say the state has the people and infrastructure in place to ramp up the vaccination effort, including contracting with a “mass vaccinator,” but there’s not enough vaccine. Anticipating a week-to-week increase in supply, the state next week is now expecting the same number of doses as it got last week.“If we’re not getting the stuff, how can we vaccinate people?” Evers said.Evers has called on the federal government to provide the state with a larger share of vaccine, which is allocated on the basis of population, because of Republican-led efforts to block mitigation strategies like stay-at-home orders, capacity limits for bars, restaurants and other businesses, and his mask mandate, currently the only statewide COVID-19 regulation in place.On Friday, state Sen. Steve Nass, R-Whitewater, announced that he plans to offer a joint legislative resolution to quash the mandate.“The time has come for the Wisconsin Legislature to stand up for civil liberties and put an end to the excessive actions of Governor Evers to control the people of this state with unending Covid-19 emergency declarations,” Nass said in a statement.State Republicans have repeatedly blamed the slow vaccine rollout on bureaucratic snafus, particularly the process for deciding who is in the Phase 1b group that will be next in line for vaccinations.&nbsp;Willems Van Dijk said Friday that Phase 1b will begin Monday with the start of vaccinations for police and firefighters, and that the state would finalize the remainder of that group next week.“We keep going back to the supply issue, and everything seems to get blamed on supply, supply, supply,” said Assembly Health Committee chair Rep. Joe Sanfelippo at a committee hearing on Thursday. He complained that the effort is being held up by “bureaucratic footsie.”During the meeting, members grilled DHS Assistant Deputy Secretary Lisa Olson about the rollout.“What is our contingency plan for when supply does ramp up?” he asked.Olson said the state has 1,200 vaccinators in who are “eagerly awaiting the vaccines."“We have the system, we have the infrastructure in place, and we are ready to go,” she said.She said the state is prioritizing the vaccine based on CDC guidelines and supply issues. The first vaccines have been going to the state’s approximately 400,000 frontline health care workers, including EMS personnel, and 57,000 nursing home residents and staff.A subcommittee for the state Disaster Medical Advisory Committee this week issued recommendations for Phase 1b for public comment. Those recommendations include:Likely to be included in the 1c phase of the rollout are Black, Latinx and Native American people because those groups have been hit particularly hard by the pandemic, those with other “socioeconomic vulnerability” and those with medical conditions that put them at risk for serious illness.Phase 2, expected to start in the late spring or early summer, will include anyone 16 and older who hasn’t been vaccinated.Sanfelippo expressed frustration at the timeline.“That’s just unacceptable,” he said. “We’ve known that these vaccines were coming and we’ve known that this process needs to be put into place for several months now. And for us to wait until July to get to the general public, that’s just not fast enough.”Sanfelippo pointed to data showing that only about a third of the doses allocated to the state so far have been administered.As of Friday, 213,056 doses of 607,650 allocated had been used. Those receiving a second shot numbered 30,780.Olson said that the federal government requires the state to reserve a third of the vaccines for a federal program to vaccinate residents and staff at long-term care facilities, and a third is in transit. She said there is also a seven-to-10-day lag time from the time the state receives its allocation to when it gets to vaccinators.Olson also announced the launch next month of a preliminary registration system that will let people who want the vaccine sign up, and the system will connect them with a mass vaccination site or local vaccination clinic when those become available. The system would work like the system, which allows online registration for testing.Also on Friday, health officials announced the launch of a Mobile Vaccination Program, to launch on Jan. 19. The nine teams of 12 to 15 people will start by working with local and tribal health departments to fill gaps in vaccine delivery, including the vaccination of police and firefighters. The effort is expected to expand in coming months.&nbsp;“This pandemic has amplified health inequities throughout the state — we have seen how differences in opportunity, resources, and access to quality health care have exacerbated this public health crisis,” said DHS Secretary Andrea Palm in a statement announcing the teams. “That is why this program is an especially critical tool in Wisconsin’s vaccination rollout. The Mobile Vaccination initiative will help close gaps in accessibility and ensure that every Wisconsinite will have the opportunity to get protected against COVID-19.”Become a Cap Times member today and enjoy great benefits.Questions?{{title}}{{summary}}You don't have any notifications.Get up-to-the-minute news sent straight to your device.Topics

You are the owner of this article.You have permission to edit this article.Gov. Tony Evers’ administration and legislative Republicans Friday ended a week of finger pointing over the state’s sluggish vaccine rollout as a promised federal increase in vaccine supply evaporated.Only days ago, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar and Vice President Mike Pence told governors the federal government would release vaccine doses held in reserve for second shots, required to complete the vaccination protocol, and dole them out to states.But on Friday, the reported that federal officials had...

Tony Evers calls failed promise for more vaccine from feds 'a slap in the face'

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