White House planning to forecast vaccine shipments months in advance

The background: Early in the vaccine rollout, states complained they weren’t getting enough notice of vaccine shipments. Soon after taking office, Biden’s Covid team committed to providing states with three-week estimates into their vaccine allocations.

Over the past month, weekly vaccine shipments to states have steadily increased from 8.6 million shots to 14.5 million.

“States are really starting to look at the bigger picture, and to do that you really need a better sense of how many doses are coming and when,” said Claire Hannan, the head of the Association of Immunization Managers.
However, states will still want details about how many doses will be spread across federally run programs that ship vaccines directly to retail pharmacy and community health center sites.

What’s next: Vaccine supply is supposed to increase significantly in the spring. The candidate from Johnson & Johnson could receive an emergency use authorization from FDA as soon as this weekend, giving the U.S. a third shot against the coronavirus. The U.S. is on track to have 3 million doses per day available by April, drugmakers testified this week.