Cuomo expanding COVID vaccine eligibility for elderly, distribution sites after week of push back
ALBANY — New York will vastly expand COVID vaccine distribution and eligibility next week to include the elderly, first responders and teachers after a week of pleading from Mayor de Blasio and other frustrated local officials.
Gov. Cuomo, who spent the week pushing back on the expansion and criticizing the sluggish roll out of vaccinations at hospitals, said Friday that thousands of new distribution sites, including pharmacies and medical offices, will be allowed to take reservations and administer immunizations to the widened pool of recipients amid criticisms that doses were going unused.
“The hospitals were slow. They’re ramping up too slowly,” the governor said during an afternoon press briefing. “So we’re going to accelerate the distribution and what we’re going to do is add new distribution networks to supplement the hospitals.”
The state will launch a website with information about reservations and availability of doses on Monday.
Cuomo said the expansion comes with several caveats as he warned that some will wait weeks to get immunized as the supply from the federal government is only about 300,000 a week at the moment. He also said the state is mandating that distribution be done fairly and equitably.
In an oddly timed tweet that came after Cuomo’s announcement, de Blasio vowed to defy state mandates and begin administering immunizations to the elderly next week.
“New York City has heard enough. We will begin administering shots to City Workers and the elderly in 1B starting on Monday,” the mayor wrote moments after Cuomo already conceded that the state will open up eligibility.
The pair of politicians have been at odds all week as de Blasio begged the state to allow unused doses to go to vulnerable and older New Yorkers. The governor repeatedly pushed back, saying that getting health care workers on the front lines of the pandemic took precedence.
Cuomo also threatened early in the week to penalize hospitals that failed to distribute doses, going so far as to float the idea of redistributing vials from under-performing medical centers.
On Friday, the governor said instead that slow-moving hospitals simply won’t receive new allocations.
In total, 479,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been given in New York, Cuomo said, with the bulk being doled out through hospitals and state allocations and about 79,000 through a federal program assisting in inoculations at nursing homes.
Yet only 23% of the state’s health care workers and those at eligible nursing homes have received initial doses, according to officials.
Cuomo expressed confidence that all elder care facility residents and staff willing to be vaccinated will get doses by end of next week.
The expanded categories of eligible New Yorkers includes anyone over the age of 75, teacher, police officers and firefighters, public transit workers and public safety workers. The governor encouraged departments and unions to spearhead vaccination efforts and to prioritize the most vulnerable within those categories.
Cuomo said that the state will “allocate vaccines to distribution network proportionally by group and by region” to ensure fairness.
Millions of people will now be able to sign up for vaccinations, but the actual process will take weeks, Cuomo warned.
“At this rate, it will take us 14 weeks to do 1A and 1B. Fourteen weeks is an eternity of time,” he said, referring to the state’s categorizations of those eligible. “Don’t be surprised if that appointment is three months from now.”
Even with the expansion and sites like the Javits Center being turned into distribution centers, the biggest hurdle to mass immunizations remains the limited supply of doses coming from the federal government, according to the governor.
“The supply is a major problem,” he said. “We’ll wind up having 3,000 distribution points in a couple of weeks. But none of them will have nearly enough vaccines.”
Earlier in the day, de Blasio ramped up his attacks on the governor with renewed demands that the state allow vaccinations for the next category of recipients in line, which includes police and people 75 and older.
De Blasio’s emotional plea came as New Yorkers learned some vaccine doses were thrown out due to a lack of qualified takers – that is, people in the 1A vaccination phase, which includes front line doctors and nurses.
“We’re only asking for the freedom to vaccinate,” the mayor said at his morning press briefing. “I’d like to believe, as more and more voices all over the city and all over the state are saying in chorus ‘give us the freedom to vaccinate,’ that the state’s going to get the message.”
On Wednesday, de Blasio announced that 25,000 NYPD cops would be eligible to receive vaccinations because they’re trained to provide medical assistance through the use of CPR and NARCAN, an opioid overdose drug.
But the announcement was walked back a day later when Cuomo said that they are not eligible until vaccines are distributed to those health care workers in Phase 1A.
On Friday, de Blasio questioned that logic, given the fact that vaccinations have already been administered to FDNY EMT workers.
“The state of New York said New York City is not allowed to provide the vaccine to NYPD officers – even though they do provide CPR, they do provide NARCAN, they put themselves on the line in very frontline ways to save lives, they’re not allowed to be vaccinated,” he said. “That just makes no sense whatsoever.”