Shiawassee Times

With COVID-19 still spreading like wildfire throughout the country and the world, the pressure is on state governments to ensure that their citizens have access to the new coronavirus vaccines that have begun rolling out.

After a very slow start that saw some embarrassing stumbles on the part of the Michigan state government and public health department, the state has finally begun to make strides and improve its process. Unfortunately, many still believe that its capabilities are not nearly good enough. 

A few weeks ago, Michigan ranked 45th in the country in terms of vaccination rate, according to Bridge Michigan. As of late January, Michigan now comes in at 20th place. Although this is an improvement, health officials and residents have both expressed their frustration in recent weeks as the death toll in Michigan has neared 15,000, according to Michigan.gov.

About 1.5 million doses of the vaccine have been allocated to Michigan, with just over 800,000 having been administered as of late January. Michigan officials have stated that their ultimate goal is to vaccinate at least 70% of those aged 16 and older, which would mean more than 5.7 million people. The state clearly has a long way to go if it wants to meet this goal. 

Macomb County Executive Mark Hackel said, “That’s been the incredible challenge: the demand does not meet the availability of the supply right now.” 

Hackel has said that his county is able to vaccinate 50,000 people a week, but they are only receiving 5,000 doses of the vaccine. This, he says, is a crippling blow to their capacity to administer the vaccine on a large scale. 

An additional source of frustration is that there appears to be little consistency in the vaccine distribution from county to county. Detroit has administered just over 15,000 doses, while small rural counties have outpaced that number significantly. 

Michigan health officials continue to scramble to find the best way to distribute the vaccines efficiently.