If you think Texas’ COVID-19 vaccine plan has problems, look at this state’s struggles
A state attorney general who refuses to join his counterparts’ condemnation of the mob assault on the U.S. Capitol.
A forgettable former state senator whose only claim to fame was her pink-sneaker-clad filibuster of a 20-week abortion
The fact that Confederate Heroes Day is still a state holiday.
These are just a few reasons why a non-native Texan like me sometimes cringes at the leaders and politics of the state I now call home.
But of all the things about life in the Lone Star State that deserve criticism, the state’s administration of the COVID-19 vaccine is not one of them.
I write this from my childhood home in Pennsylvania, where until this week, neither of my parents — both 70, one a two-time cancer survivor — were even eligible to receive the vaccine.
That’s because it took until Tuesday of this week for the Pennsylvania Department of Health to expand vaccine eligibility in its 1A category beyond nurses, doctors and school nurses, as well as residents and staff of long-term care facilities.
It’s the third week of January!
Meanwhile, back in Texas, I can tick off a long list of people I know — those older than 65 or those younger with a health vulnerability — who have already had their first shot and are only days away from their second.
To be sure, the vaccine rollouts in Texas generally and Tarrant County specifically haven’t been free of hiccups.
Tarrant County commissioners worried early about long lines in the cold at vaccine administration hubs. Some people waited for hours only to be asked to return again the following day.
There are legitimate concerns that public outreach efforts are too weak and not reaching the most vulnerable communities and neighborhoods.
But many of those early local problems have been resolved, so much so that agencies across Texas are adopting Arlington officials’ vaccine administration efforts.
The Esports Stadium Arlington, a major vaccine distribution hub, has become an example of success and even earned a visit from Gov. Greg Abbott.
And in what appears to be an effort to target outbreaks, Tarrant County health officials just announced that they will prioritize vaccinating people in the 10 ZIP codes most affected by the virus.
It’s far from a well-oiled machine, but Tarrant’s efforts look pretty good compared to Pennsylvania. To accommodate the expansion of 1A vaccine recipients, Philadelphia is just now unrolling an official vaccine sign-up.
It gets worse. For months, a more enterprising third-party group has been registering people for vaccines. Great, except that the group says it has shared registrants’ information with the city.
City officials say otherwise, leaving 60,000 registrants in limbo. Will they have to re-register? Go to the back of the line? Still unclear.
All of these problems contribute to Pennsylvania’s slower vaccine distribution.
According to the New York Times’ COVID-19 vaccine data map, Pennsylvania has administered less than half of its vaccine doses — 42 percent.
Texas, on the other hand, as of this writing has administered 55 percent of its doses; only West Virginia, North and South Dakota, Connecticut and Washington, D.C., have used more of their doses.
I’m not picking on Pennsylvania in particular.
States such as New York and Virginia, lauded by the media for their governors’ efforts to contain the virus and praised for the economically devastating lockdowns they imposed, seem to be having a much harder time getting needles in arms than they did fining people for not wearing masks.
And I’m not foolishly tooting Texas’ horn, either.
Tarrant County has been the epicenter of the pandemic in Texas for weeks, for a variety of factors, many of them not caused by government failure. And while the state still has a ways to go before it is a leader in vaccine administration, the pastures are greener in Texas.
Now, let’s work on Confederate Heroes Day.
This story was originally published January 21, 2021 at 10:24 AM.
