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Posted on 02/27/2021 11:21:44 AM PST by lightman
The good news is Pennsylvania no longer sits among the bottom-dwelling states in vaccinating people against COVID-19.
The bad news is Pennsylvania is still Pennsylvania. This means that even at its best and no matter the issue, it’s hanging around or just below the middle of states.
This week, for example, 28 states have vaccinated higher percentages of their populations. But there used to be 38. So, we’re making progress in climbing toward mediocrity.
Meanwhile, Gov. Tom Wolf chants his mantra: “We need to do better.” You’ll be happy to know he’s tapped a bipartisan legislative task force to work on the problem. And just hired an international management firm, the Boston Consulting Group, you know, to manage things.
The contract runs from now to August. The estimated cost is $11.5 million.
And, yeah, it’s like saying, “Look, we have no idea what we’re doing, let’s pay somebody else to do it.” But it seems to be a popular move.
New York state hired the same firm to work on vaccine plans; Connecticut hired the firm last May, for $2 million, to help its reopening efforts; Rhode Island contracted the firm for $1.85 million worth of COVID-related assistance.
So, Pennsylvania’s boldly going where other states have gone before – just in a bigger way.
This new aggressiveness comes after a befuddled, patchwork of rollout efforts that frustrated countless folks who fruitlessly sought vaccine appointments online or by phone, only to come up empty over and over again.
Then came admission of a colossal screwup related to second-dose Moderna vaccines (as in there isn’t enough), forcing maybe 100,000 Pennsylvanians to delay and reschedule second shots.
The Health Department reported the goof, which had been playing out for weeks, as basically nobody’s fault. This even though the department first urged vaccine providers to use second-dose allotments for first-shots, then said providers erred in doing so.
Go on, shake your head.
Or find comfort in the inspiring words of Wolf on the day the screw-up was revealed: “We will look for ways and find ways to make the system even better.”
No wonder we need a global consultant.
Now, our sole self-proclaimed independent state lawmaker (in a state in need of many more independents) is pushing a bill to create a vaccine czar.
Sen. John Yudichak, of Luzerne County, said in a statement that former Health Secretary Rachel Levine (currently with the Biden Administration) left the state last month “with no coherent plan in place” to get vaccines to citizens.
He said the Health Department has created confusion and doubt, that Wolf’s task force is six months too late, and we need a “logistics czar” to manage private-sector experts in vaccine distribution.
“Folks should be outraged that eight weeks after we get the vaccine from the federal government, we create a legislative task force to figure out how to get it to people,” Yudichak tells me.
Indeed. And maybe $11.5 million buys us better days.
But, as I’ve noted in past, everyone, everywhere knew a vaccine was coming. Anyone with a semblance of sense knew distribution meant giant challenges. And planning, task forces and vaccine czars should have been in place last summer.
It’s almost as if those in charge, politicians and their minions, were preoccupied with something else. Campaign 2020? Paring down the governor’s emergency powers? Debating COVID restrictions? Partisan politics? Re-impeaching an impeached ex-president?
But that can’t be. That would be morally repugnant, right?
So, we blame the feds in general, anonymous providers, the supply chain, the weather, the scope of the problem, anything or anyone to avoid the truth: government leaders in both parties blew opportunities to build a system to better distribute vaccines.
As a result, any prospect of crisis performance improving public confidence or trust in government was squandered.
Now, however, UPMC is offering registration for vaccine appointments. Penn State Health is opening vaccination centers. And Democratic state lawmakers are pushing legislation to offer the kind of statewide vaccine registry that the Democratic Wolf administration declined to offer.
So, maybe, at last, there’s an awakening. Maybe things are starting to get done. And maybe Pennsylvania can continue its climb – to mediocrity and beyond.
John Baer may be reached at baer.columnist@gmail.com
Pennsylvania Ping!
Please ping me with articles of interest.
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If the vaccine process doesn’t improve soon, the “slope-shouldered mediocrity” Wolf will simply have to shut down truck stops again.
Just how many states are supposed to be above the mean? What a shocker to see when you rank 50 states almost half are below the mean. Shocking I say!
Quite reading after that. If you’re that innumerate I’m done.
Quit.
Every senior I know in our area of PA who wants to get vaccinated has been vaccinated or has an appointment to get vaccinated. I also know some seniors who have chosen not to make an appointment. Lehigh Valley Hospital Network & St. Luke’s Hospital have been handling it here.
Interesting. We didn’t have a plan or even guidelines. The state left things up to the giant health providers. My 85+ year old parents just got their first round last weekend.
Meanwhile, West Virginia allows local pharmacists to administer their shots and they are way ahead of PA.
Meanwhile, we are pissing away $11M to figure out how to get the vaccine out, after the most vulnerable have had their shots. Pissing away money way too late......if your own team it too incompentent, they experts should have been brought in last year.
Wolf is terrible. God complex guy who is a functional idiot. How he ever ran a business is beyond me.
Every senior I know in central PA who wants to get vaccinated has NOT been vaccinated. Some have found it impossible to get on a waiting list and others on a waiting list are still waiting to be scheduled. Here's the PA utility for finding a provider and scheduling a shot: https://www.health.pa.gov/topics/disease/coronavirus/Vaccine/Pages/Vaccine.aspx#map
Good luck finding appointment openings in central PA! E.g., CVS is one ot the supposedly many vaccine providers in the nation but you will not find an appointment open in any of their pharmacies in a 100 mile radius of Harrisburg.
Wolf and Levine have failed miserably in getting vaccines to Pennsylvanians. And now the dems want to give Levine a federal Dept of Health position. God help us!
Health Secretary Rachel Levine (currently with the Biden Administration) was in charge...now he’s an Assistant in charge of the nations health.....LOLOLOLOL.....what a total insane world!
Credit where credit is due, the new Health Secretary seems to know what she’s doing and is making progress to unf*** the terrible public health situation that Dr. Levine left her.
Some people are going to keep their identity politics blinders on and insist everything good and bad about Dr. Levine begins and ends with his identity as a woman, but really that would be a curious side note if Pennsylvania government hadn’t handled covid so incompetently.
Since it is not a VACCINE I have chosen in PA not to take the injection. BTW, I am an old fella.
I’m eligible but can’t get an appointment for a vaccination, either. The local hospital has put me on a waiting list but can’t promise I’ll get a vaccination there. They recommend that I try pharmacies and other healthcare facilities.
Their websites say they are booked up for months. That’s true for every pharmacy I’ve checked within 50 miles or more of my town. CVS, Rite Aid, and pharmacies at grocery stores. None has an opening for an appointment.
Supposedly, Pennsylvania’s health department is considering “equity” in its decisions about which counties get vaccine. And my county hasn’t gotten any vaccine for days.
I’m betting there aren’t enough minorities so we’re not a priority for vaccine. It’s being distributed, instead, in the Philadelphia area and Pittsburgh. Pennsylvania’s vaccination process is a disaster and it’s the fault of the Wolf administration and Rachel Levine. Incompetence at every level. Democrat bean counters and equity officers are probably pouring over census data to identify where minority communities are concentrated in the state. That’s what’s holding up and complicating distribution. What a sorry ass state Pennsylvania has become under Wolf and his henchmen.
I do not believe that statement about every person got a Vaccine from St Lukes or Lehigh Valley that wanted one.
My husband is 65 and a mail carrier he has been trying for over 2 months to get a vaccine and can’t get it!
I am 61 and can’t get it! I met the requirements. Rite Aid is suppose to be one of the Pharmacies that is to have it along with the above hospitals. We are registered with the hospitals but are waiting.
I can stay isolated but my husband can not!
So the dim with that says every one they know got the vaccine they know has no brains.
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