The use of an effective vaccine could be an important step in the fight against COVID-19, but delivering the vaccine to more than 330 million people is a hard feat to achieve, according to some US health authorities.
A memo shared by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention urges health departments from all over the US to create vaccination strategies before the start of October when the COVID-19 vaccine could be ready for use according to optimistic predictions. In theory, this would facilitate vaccination campaigns.
Understaffed and lacking resources
However, it seems that the plans of the CDC clash with the actual capabilities of several health departments, which argue that they have been underfunded for years and lack the required personnel, funds, and tools which are needed to convince people to accept the vaccine, and then to vaccinate them and keep track of who got the shot.
Several doctors, nurses, and health officials who were interviewed by popular news outlets have stated that the readiness of conducting mass vaccination campaigns in the US is questionable, with the matters being made worse by inconsistent data offered by the federal governments.
Major gaps
Even the memo share by the CDC fails to mention how to track or register the persons who received the shot. It is also not clear who will provide the safety gear and the tools which are needed to administer the vaccine without exposing everyone to potential health risks.
It is also worth noting that recent polls that only around 50% of Americans are willing to be vaccinated, which means that additional funding is needed to raise awareness about the benefits of vaccination. Some are also worried that the vaccine won’t be safe since it was developed at a fast pace.
Approximately 200 million Americans should be vaccinated to achieve a target herd immunity level of 70%.