New York City will run out of COVID-19 vaccine supplies by the end of next week, Mayor Bill de Blasio warned on Friday. The shortage would disrupt the mayor's goal of administering 1 million doses across the five boroughs by the end of January, delaying the prospect of rapidly achieving herd immunity and reopening safely.
"We will run out of vaccine next week in New York City if there's not a very different approach from the federal government, and the state government, and the manufacturers," de Blasio said on the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. "We're not going to have enough vaccine by the end of next week."
A source within the de Blasio administration told Gothamist that the city currently has 186,000 doses on hand right now. At its current pace with doling out doses, the city's supply will run out by January 21st.
This morning, de Blasio pointed out that the vaccine shortage has even kept hospitals such as Mt. Sinai and NYU Langone from booking new appointments. A review of the hospitals' websites confirms this. Mt. Sinai has also been canceling exiting appointments.
Earlier on Friday, the Trump administration admitted that the nation's vaccine reserves ran empty last weekend, well before the Health and Human Services Department announced on Tuesday that it would release stockpiled doses. It is unclear when the federal government will be able to come through with another batch of vials, potentially slowing access for millions of people still waiting to get the vaccine. This includes those falling in the Phase 1b category, the largest of the group in Phase 1 of the state's vaccine rollout plan.
New York City has ramped up vaccinations across New York City after opening roughly 160 vaccination centers, including several 24/7 sites to get as many as 7,000 people inoculated with either the Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. About 250 vaccine centers will be opened citywide by the end of the month. Between Monday and Thursday, 125,000 people received a shot, de Blasio said. He expects that more than 175,000 people will be vaccinated this week, surpassing the goal he set on Monday.
De Blasio said that anyone who still comes for their first appointment will get a second appointment for now, given the three- and four-week waiting period between the second shots for Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, respectively.
"But the increasing problem now is there's not enough supply of vaccine to keep up with the first appointment let alone the second appointment," de Blasio said.
Currently, the city receives 100,000 doses, which New York City Council members and de Blasio called a paltry sum.