During his Monday, March 8 coronavirus response media-briefing, Gov. Jim Justice announced that West Virginia, through its partnership with the Federal Pharmacy program, will now be working directly with Medical Shoppes/Leader Network of pharmacies in an effort to vaccinate up to 5,000 additional residents every week.
“It will be similar to the rollout with Walgreens where doses go directly from the federal government to pharmacies,” said Jim Hoyer, director of West Virginia’s Joint Interagency Task Force. “But we will work with those pharmacies to identify the appropriate individuals to receive the vaccines and those pharmacies have the ability to call those individuals directly.”
Through the expansion of the partnership, West Virginia’s pandemic response leadership team anticipates approximately 5,000 more doses of the COVID-19 vaccine will be allocated and then distributed to 59 pharmacy locations across the state.
Thus far, West Virginia’s vaccination effort has resulted in 558,534 doses being administered. In total, 12.1% of the state’s population has now been fully vaccinated against the virus.
According to a statement released on Monday by the governor’s office, this is “a rate so high that, if West Virginia were its own country, it would rank as the 12th-best rate of any nation in the world.”
Currently, vaccinations have been made available to all residents 50-years and older, education-workers between the ages of 40 and 50, and all West Virginians over the age of 16-years with certain pre-existing medical conditions.
The West Virginia Daily News will provide updates on the state’s COVID-19 vaccination efforts as additional details are made available.
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