Fox 17 reports that even though the state of Michigan is moving to the next phase of COVID-19 vaccinations for essential workers and people over the age of 65, the Kent, Kalamazoo, Ionia, and Allegan County health departments say that they will not be ready to start the next phase on January 11. The problem comes from the various health departments not having enough vaccines and supply

As Dr. Adam London, Ph.D., Kent County Health Department Administrative Health Officer told Fox 17,

“I think it would be foolish of us to think that this is all going to happen smoothly. There are going to be challenges.

The supply of vaccines is extremely limited right now. We are only getting a little bit from Lansing week by week, but we are going to do our very best to get this to the people of Kent County as quickly as we can.”

Fox 17 says currently all four of the West Michigan health departments are struggling to take care of people in the Phase 1A group, which includes First-Responders, EMS, healthcare workers, and people who reside in long-term care facilities.  They all say that it's not a case of not having enough patients to give the vaccine to, it's actually having a steady supply of the COVID-19 vaccine.

As Dr. London told Fox 17,

“I’m not exactly sure where the bottleneck is with a vaccine supply, other than the fact that what we are doing right now is really unheard of in history, and the fact that we have worldwide demand for these products. It’s going to be a little bit difficult to manage that supply and the demand for a little while here.”

Fox 17 says that Allegan and Ionia counties are expecting another shipment of vaccines around the end of this month, which is when they can start Phase 1B, while Kent County says that they're not sure when their next batch will be delivered.

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