Health workers are of course the people who need covid-19 vaccinations first. They are the ones most likely to be exposed, and their expertise is needed to vaccinate the rest of us and treat those who fall ill.
So it was dismaying to learn that people who didn’t qualify for this initial round of shots nonetheless showed up at some Los Angeles County vaccination centers to skip the line—and succeeded. Some pretended to be health workers and were allowed to go ahead without any validating documents. Some were honest about their situation and still managed to talk their way into a shot.
It wasn’t a lot of people, and most of the ones who did have special reason to be afraid. Elderly Angelenos, many with medical conditions that make them especially vulnerable, were desperate to be protected. But so are many others who have good reason to want the vaccine.
The procedural gap that allowed this to happen has reportedly been closed. But it also reveals other issues. People are afraid and confused. They aren’t really sure when they are likely to qualify for vaccination or which group they belong in (there is a long list of tiers suggested by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which calls for sorting recipients by occupation, physical condition and age). They don’t know how they will get their shots. Will it be at their doctor’s office? At public vaccination clinics? At a pharmacy?
Though the federal government helped speed the development and approval of effective vaccines, it failed to plan an effective rollout even though it had months to do so. It left that effort to states—there are now more than 50 rollout plans—providing only suggestions for who should get the precious vials first. It’s a messy system that is at least partly responsible for the nation’s slow start on vaccinations.
Vaccination is something most of us will just have to wait for—and hope it proves effective against the new variant that’s been found. People without risks or essential jobs are looking at the summer, assuming the rollout goes more smoothly from this point on. As with personal protective equipment, the federal government took a hands-off approach and left too much to states, which were poorly equipped to carry this out.
At minimum, far more outreach is needed, as well as regular updates on how many people have been vaccinated so far in which categories. Beyond that, the state and counties should have an online query system on which people can get answers to common questions and find out where they are in the waiting list and when they are most likely to receive their doses.