With Pinal County continuing to experience a critical shortage of the COVID-19 vaccine, the Board of Supervisors on Wednesday voted unanimously to authorize Chairman Stephen Miller to write to State and Federal representatives requesting a significant increase in doses allocated to the County.

After receiving an initial allocation of 10,000 doses, subsequent weekly allocations declined to just 2000 and 1800 respectively. Only 2000 doses have been allocated in the next allocation, part of which has arrived to date.
The County has received positive feedback for its strategy around administering the vaccine to residents, opting to work with 14 Community Partners to vaccinate as quickly and efficiently as possible. This allowed the County to be the first in the State of Arizona to move from the 1A group (Healthcare workers) to the 1B group (Over 75s, Law Enforcement, Teachers, Critical workers).

However, with the 1A and 1B groups estimated to be 75,662, and the County having only received 14,800 vaccines to date, the County is a long way from being able to meet demand for these groups, let alone the remaining adult population of Pinal County.
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And late Wednesday, the Arizona Department of Health Services announced they are adding the 65 and over population to the 1B group, which will significantly increase the number of those eligible to be vaccinated at this time.

The County has now onboarded a further 12 partners, bringing the total to 26 Community Partners, all ready to vaccinate Pinal County residents.