Texas Jeff

Over the past 7 days, Texas has averaged around 56k-60k "first shots" per day. Texas has given 478k shots in the last seven days (first and second shots), about 68k shots per day. The number is growing as more second shots arrive. Eventually the second shot number should roughly equal the first shot number if vaccine allocations remain constant.

Texas Week 7 is out: https://www.dshs.state.tx.us/news/updates/COVIDVaccineAllocation-Week7.pdf Very similar to Week 6 for the hubs. That is good because the hubs need predictable supply to just keep going. In Travis Co, if you don't have a friend at the DSHS Central Warehouse, or are not affiliated with UT, or are not 65+ or don't have insurance, you really need to look elsewhere. I *hope* those with the vax in Travis Co are focused on the 65+ category.

That article said he moved to Bee Cave, but he was complaining about Belterra and NW Austin. I think that dude never figured out where he was. He complained about open spaces while being just a few minutes from the Wildflower Center, the greenbelt, Zilker, Barton Springs, the hike and bike trail. Not sure he looked that hard...

I was just looking at that this morning. In Texas, 65+ accounts for about 72% of all deaths. 80+ is about half the death. If you think about a little herd immunity effect once you start vaccinating all of the seniors, you are probably right with the 80% number. I don't have trend data yet, but I can say that in Texas, about 12.7% of folks over 65 have already had at least one shot (about 480k out of 3.77M seniors). Consider that the first two weeks were just Phase 1A, so really we have been working on the 65+ group for 3-4 weeks. You can project that out, but it's going to take a while. Even if Texas just focused on 65+ and continued to receive about 330k first shots per week, it would take 10-11 weeks to get first shots to 100% of the 65+ group.

At current 7 day average first shot vaccination rates, Texas will cross 50% of the over 16 population on July 21st and 100% next January 18th. Believe it or not, that's progress. About ten days ago, the 100% date was in June 2022.

HEB's website is awesome. Simple to use, easy to understand, appears to scale, appears to function...

The allocation numbers are from the feds for Texas, going back to week 1. I got them from the HHS website. I think they reflect all doses manufactured and allocated, but I am not certain. The feds may have held back some for themselves. The "actual" numbers are from the Texas dashboard.

OK, a little chart for today. I have been tracking vaccine allocation to Texas and the amounts vaccinated as reported by the state. This chart shows you a solid blue line showing total first shot federal allocations for Texas, combining Pfizer and Moderna. The date on the chart is the first date of the week of the allocation, so the earliest possible data that shots could have been received. The vertical axis shows the percent of Texans that could have been covered by the allocations. The dashed blue line shows actual first shot results, shots in arms reported to the tracking database, and then shown on the dashboard. The orange lines show the same thing for the second shot, solid orange represents allocations and dashed orange is shots in arms, reported and shown on the tracking dashboard. The lines go flat on the top because I assume that there will be no more allocations other than what Texas has been promised so far. That's probably not true, they will probably continue upward. There will always be a lag between shot allocations and shots reported to the dashboard. Right now the lag is pretty big, like 2.5 weeks. The state can narrow the gap by getting better at giving shots, but ultimately can't go any faster unless allocations increase.

In theory a second shot should follow the first shot at the same place you got the first shot. Three weeks later for Pfizer, four weeks later for Moderna.

From the article: "He says that will mean someone in their 30s with an underlying condition in the priority ZIP code will move ahead of someone in their 80s not in a targeted ZIP code." That is an amazingly bad idea, in my opinion. If the politics gets worse, Abbott needs to change course and just do it by age, statewide. Drop the age as lines get shorter. I get trying to make sure that old folks in all parts of town get the vaccine, especially ahead of healthier folks elsewhere, but this is too much steering.

You know, I don't mind being in a line for the vaccine, or having others in front of me, or letting 65+ go first ... whatever the rules are. But it is crazy that there are different rules and registration for each county. It is crazy that one county gets to make rules for the region, because they effectively control all of the vaccine available. The state is giving vax to the hubs with the promise that the hubs are going to distribute it according to state guidelines. Austin tacks on more rules, gives it to legislators but denies it to people because they have health insurance unless you are willing to lie and say you don't. San Antonio has a different system, Dallas a different system, UT gets vax but evidently can't give it to anyone outside of the system even though I think Dell Med is partially taxpayer funded. It is crazy. The state should have set up hubs with a single registration system and the same set of rules for everyone. I don't mind being in line but it would be nice to know *where* I was in line and nice to have uniform rules set across the state.

Does anyone know if the AZ and J&J vaccines reduce the intensity of COVID, should you get infected after vaccination? I think their test data is showing lower efficacy than the Moderna and Pfizer vaccine. I think I have read that if you get COVID after having the Modera/Pfizer vax, you are likely to have a mild case. I might take the AZ/J&J stuff if offered ... but it would be nice to know that if I did get COVID then I would be at lower risk for a severe case.

There's a bright spot emerging in the Panhandle, let's see if the trends continue. Amarillo is hosting walk-up vax clinics for people in 1A and 1B, no appointments required, just walk up and wait in line. You might be in line for a while... Covid Act Now is showing "better" colors for the Panhandle counties and showing reproductive rates below 1.

Federal allocations have been flat for the last three weeks, varying between 317k and 332k first shots for Texas per week. It's not nothing but it's not growing. A million first shots every three weeks in a state with ~28 million people.

Texas Week 6 is out: https://www.dshs.state.tx.us/news/updates/COVIDVaccineAllocation-Week6.pdf Travis Co is all APH all the time, with a smidge more for UT. Wilco getting 6000 doses at Family Emergency Rooms Cedar Park, about half of Travis's allocation.

Well, that's a fair point that I hadn't considered. Hopefully these centers would not open up a vial until they needed it. I wonder how long it takes to open a vial, thaw it out if needed, mix it up, and get it into arms. Ideally they would waste only a partial vial each day, but some kind of standby list for the centers around closing time might be helpful.

Yeah, I agree. Ideally there would be one place to submit your info and then some kind of green light when it is time to go get your shot, and a choice of locations. It would be nice if you know about what date you would get that green light. You want to have more than one location, to spread people out, but you don't want to have 1000, since you have use up a whole vial once you open it. You could have drivers shuttling vaccine from the central location to the satellite locations as needed. I keep coming back to the early voting model. 30 or so places around town that look mostly the same. You want some set of places to get it, but you all want them working about the same way so that you can allocate resources and track results.

I think one of the mentally stressful parts of this was caused by the "Phase 1B" shift making almost one third of Texans eligible to sign up at the same time. Obviously the state and counties had all summer and fall to think of how to do this and either failed to act or failed to come up with a good plan. But, they seem to be reacting in real time towards a solution. Eventually the line will die down a bit and we'll talk about the next phase. IMHO, it would be nice if they just kept us in 1B but lowered the age limit little by little. So maybe one week it's 63 and over, or those with co-morbidities ... next week it is 61 and over or co-morbidities, and so on. Try to manage it so that once you are eligible you have a pretty good chance of getting a first shot in the next two weeks. People would know the current age limit and have some idea of how fast it is coming down. They would be able to project when they might get it. And it would look like progress was being made as the age limit comes down. Otherwise we are going to argue about who goes next and have these giant scrambles each time a new large group is eligible.

I think anyone can get a vaccine if you can get an appointment. I have seen other states accepting out of state residents. When I signed up for APH they only asked for a name and an email address. That led to a form asking for an address, phone number and other info, but nothing about residency or citizenship.

Yeah, like you said it should be all hands on deck... Texas as a whole has now passed 4% first shot but Travis Co is trailing the state averages.

I don't think APH has the freezers needed for Pfizer. Sometime soon there is going to be more Pfizer supply, because diversions for nursing homes are going to be completed. So, there is a chance for another distribution channel in Austin for somebody with the fancy freezers. UT, I am looking at you...

Armybrat, it's for the entire region ... so you should feel included. APH is receiving most of the vaccine for the entire region, at least this week. They are the "hub" for Central Texas.

I registered at the Austin Public Health site even though I am not 1B. I am not expecting an appointment for months. I thought it was good to just raise my hand and say I would like it, so that they can get some numbers showing where the demand is and be organized if they receive more vaccine. This is something that they could have done months ago but at least it is in place now. I am OK if they somewhat steer the vaccine, for a while, so long as they are sticking to the 1B guidelines and they are trying to find people that live in this area. They should ensure distribution across all areas of the region, all economic conditions, etc. Spread it around. Too much targeting will become unfair and inefficient. Most importantly, they should get the vaccine into willing arms as fast as possible. The bottleneck should be elsewhere.

St Davids had 3225 in stock out of 4450 doses they had received as of a few days ago. They were the only place in town with more than 1000 shots in stock other than maybe the DSHS warehouse. Sounds like maybe they are trying to give it out.

Did they say who was giving it out? Austin Public Health? DSHS? A local hospital? Guys in a white van? I'm surprised that someone can just do a pop-up no announcement everyone included clinic. Only a few Travis Co places have that kind of vax.