California’s COVID-19 vaccine supply mostly flat in April, due largely to J&J issues

As California enters its second week of broad eligibility for the COVID-19 vaccine, supply flow has remained flat for most of April.

Health officials had expected it to be a month of supply ramping up, but allocations have stayed mostly steady week to week in large part due to manufacturing issues and a federally recommended pause on the Johnson & Johnson single-dose vaccine.

California, which on April 15 made doses available to all ages 16 and older, is set to receive about 1.9 million doses of the two-dose vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna next week, down from a little over 2 million delivered this week.

Most of the decline from last week’s total comes from a dip in Pfizer second doses. Next week’s shipments will include just over 1 million shots designated as first doses, according to federal allocation data posted Wednesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

No shots of J&J are currently slated to ship to California next week due to the pause, which came after reported cases of a rare, severe blood clotting condition in six recipients nationwide.

California got more than 570,000 doses of J&J the week beginning April 5, then only 68,000 last week after a manufacturing issue caused a nationwide shortage.

A CDC advisory committee plans to meet Friday to discuss the J&J pause, meaning it is unlikely to be lifted until after that meeting. The committee also met last week but did not make a recommendation, waiting for further information and investigation into the clotting cases.

CDC data suggest there are about 1.2 million J&J doses in California providers’ inventories, compared to about 1 million already administered in the state before the pause.

To date, California providers have administered 26,454,819 doses of COVID-19 vaccine, the California Department of Public Health reported Wednesday. That’s 79% of the 33.4 million shipped to the state since mid-December.

More than 10.6 million people are fully vaccinated and another 6.54 partially vaccinated statewide, meaning about 17.1 million Californians now have at least partial protection via vaccine.

That total represents about 55% of the state’s adult population and 43% of its overall population. According to the CDC, the latter percentage ranks California 10th among the 50 states plus Washington, D.C.

How many are fully, partially vaccinated in Sacramento area?

These are the totals for combined first and second doses, administered through Tuesday, as reported by the state public health department, by recipient county of residence.

▪ Sacramento: 924,164 (58,940 doses per 100,000 residents)

▪ El Dorado: 119,039 (61,647 doses per 100,000)

▪ Placer: 273,826 (68,382 doses per 100,000)

▪ Yolo: 159,360 (71,266 doses per 100,000)

Here is what percentage of each county’s total population is fully and partially vaccinated, according to CDPH data.

Figures may be undercounts due to data reporting delays.

Northern California VA locations giving vaccines

Veterans Affairs Northern California Health Care is now offering COVID-19 vaccinations to veterans and their families at 11 clinic locations: Auburn, Chico, Fairfield, Mare Island, Martinez, Mather, McClellan, Oakland, Redding, Yreka and Yuba City.

As of this week, all of the above except Yreka are offering walk-in clinics with no appointment necessary.

Clinic days and times vary by location. More details are available at northerncalifornia.va.gov.

Sacramento-area health offices, public clinics and pharmacies

Most county health offices are splitting their direct allocations between their own county-run clinics, non-chain hospitals and other partners, including some Safeway pharmacies.

CVS, Rite Aid and Walgreens offer vaccine appointments at some of their pharmacies across California as part of a federal retail pharmacy partnership. Sam’s Club and Walmart stores also recently began offering vaccines in some parts of California. More details are available via those companies’ websites.

Sacramento

Sacramento County continues to offer drive-thru vaccine clinics at Cal Expo, McClellan Park and Natomas High School; and walk-thru clinics at California Northstate University in Elk Grove and at Sacramento State.

Cal Expo, which had used J&J before the pause, is now scheduling clinics using Pfizer.

Other first-dose clinics run through community partners have been announced through April, including Bayside Church in midtown, City Church of Sacramento in Oak Park, Orange Grove School, the county’s education office in Mather and Southside Unlimited on 47th Avenue.

Most clinics continue to require appointments in advance, but walk-in clinics are becoming more common as supply increases. Scheduling and booking information can be found at dhs.saccounty.net.

Sacramento also has CVS, Rite Aid and Walgreens stores participating in the federal partnership program, and the county is also partnered with 11 Safeway pharmacies.

The Cal Expo, McClellan Park, Sacramento State and Northstate clinics offer the Pfizer vaccine, meaning a three-week wait between doses. Safeway pharmacies offer Moderna, a four-week wait.

With eligibility expanding, Sacramento County reminds that only the Pfizer vaccine is approved for minors ages 16 and 17.

El Dorado

El Dorado runs clinics at its public health offices in Placerville and South Lake Tahoe.

The county also recently announced a first-dose Moderna clinic this coming Saturday at the El Dorado Community Health Center in Cameron Park. That clinic had dozens of slots still available as of Wednesday morning.

The county also offers a clinic at the parking structure at Red Hawk Casino in Placerville on Thursdays, also available through CalVax. It will run each Thursday through at least April 29. The clinic on Tuesday announced more first-dose slots added to this Thursday’s clinic and more second-dose shots added for next week.

The Red Hawk and Placerville public health office clinics give Pfizer shots. The South Lake Tahoe clinic uses Moderna.

Walgreens in Cameron Park and the CVS store on Palmer Drive in Cameron Park are also now offering Moderna vaccine appointments as part of the federal retail pharmacy partnership. Walmart in Placerville was offering J&J doses prior to the pause.

The county is also partnered with six Safeway stores.

More detailed information on county-run and county-partnered vaccine clinics can be found at edcgov.us/Government/hhsa/edccovid-19-clinics.

Placer

Placer County offers its county-run clinics at The Grounds, formerly the Placer County Fairgrounds, in Roseville. The Grounds is offering first-dose Pfizer appointments through Thursday this week.

Appointment links for qualifying residents are posted as they become available at placer.ca.gov/vaccineclinics.

Placer is also partnered with eight Safeway pharmacies throughout the county.

According to the CVS website, there are stores participating in the federal vaccine partnership in Auburn and Rocklin. There may also be availability at Rite Aid and Walgreens stores; users should check with individual stores for eligibility, the county says.

Appointments can also be made at Remedy RX Pharmacy in Roseville through a local partnership.

Yolo

Yolo County is holding several private clinics this week, followed by a public clinic (first-dose Moderna) on Sunday.

Private clinics include second doses for agriculture workers, first doses for homebound residents and first doses for Woodland High School students, according to the county website.

More details regarding county-run clinics are available on the county website at yolocounty.org.

Hospital systems

Hospital systems operating in multiple counties receive their own allocations from the state. All in the Sacramento area confirm they are offering vaccine appointments to all ages 16 and older.

UC Davis Health is using the state’s My Turn website as well as its MyUCDavisHealth app to schedule vaccination appointments for UC Health patients and non-patients.

UC Davis in an update to its website last week confirmed it has paused giving J&J doses, which had made up about 10% of its vaccinations, and said it does “not expect this will impact our ability to vaccinate thousands of people each day.”

Sutter Health also confirms on its patient website that it has paused appointments for the J&J vaccine. The hospital network is opening first-dose appointments for Pfizer and Moderna “as supply allows.”

Sutter on its patient website says it has administered more than 600,000 doses to date.

Kaiser Permanente is vaccinating patients in eligible groups, regardless of Kaiser membership.

Kaiser Permanente said in an update last week it has administered about 1.56 million of the 1.66 million doses it has received at Northern California facilities, and has about 370,000 future appointments scheduled.

Dignity Health’s Mercy Medical Group has begun using My Turn to schedule appointments, and is working with the state and other partners to offer vaccines to eligible Californians.