HARRISBURG, Pa. - More than 7,500 people have received the first dose of vaccines in Lehigh County and more than 5,000 in Northampton County. And if you wanted to keep track of these numbers as they increase, the State has a new tool to track that.
The Pennsylvania Department of Health now has a vaccine dashboard so the public can follow the progress of vaccine distribution.
That dashboard showsthe number of shots given out in each county.
Gov. Tom Wolf calls the dashboard along with the vaccinations themselves “new tools” to fight the coronavirus.
“I don't want Pennsylvanians to have false expectations unless the vaccine distribution from operation warp-speed increases rapidly, we anticipate that it's going to be months, not weeks until the vaccine is available for phase three distribution to the general public.”
Operation Warp-Speed is currently in phase 1-A offering the shots to healthcare providers, those in elder care facilities, and the most-vulnerable.
Pennsylvania’s Health Secretary says it will be months before COVID-19 vaccines are available to the general public.
In the meantime, Dr. Rachel Levine, Pennsylvania's health secretary, is setting aside 10% of the vaccines for “non-affiliated providers” that include anyone outside of formal health care systems such as nursing homes, doctor’s offices, home health aides, who are also on the frontlines.
“Now we estimate that there are nearly 1 million healthcare personnel across the Commonwealth that qualify for vaccination and phase one A and so it will take time for all of them to get vaccinated, it probably is going to take a couple of months,” Levine said.
Part of the reason she can’t offer a clearer timeline is in part because the Vaccine Allocation Fund from the federal government fluctuates from week to week, she said.
