COVID-19 Vaccine Update + Survey

The Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) has announced the following vaccine allocations for Collin County for week seven (the week of January 25).

• Collin County Health Care Services: 2,700 doses (Moderna vaccine)
• City of McKinney: 2,000 doses (Moderna vaccine)
• City of Allen: 2,000 doses (Moderna vaccine)
• Baylor Scott & White Health (BSW): 3,900 doses (Pfizer vaccine)

Collin County Health Care Services (CCHCS) has the capacity to administer 6,000 vaccine doses per day (in-house) and an exponentially more through our contracted vendor, Curative. CCHCS officials requested 42,000 vaccine doses from DSHS for week seven. Other Collin County hub providers (Allen, McKinney & BSW) submit their own vaccine requests to DSHS each week.

The vaccine hubs operated by Collin County and the City of McKinney have been scheduling (and will continue scheduling) vaccination appointments from the unified Collin County Vaccine Wait List hosted by Collin County and 29 local partnering agencies. This wait list is open to all Texans who are eligible, according to the DSHS Phase 1A and Phase 1B definitions. NOTE: For those that are wondering - the State of Texas mandates that entities operating vaccine "hub" locations open their wait lists to all Texans who are eligible.

The City of Allen and Baylor Scott & White Health have elected to operate their vaccine hubs independent of the local vaccine partnership, and neither entity is currently utilizing the Collin County vaccine wait list. NOTE: Collin County employees are not able to answer specific questions about the City of Allen, City of McKinney, or BSW vaccine hubs. Please refer to their specific websites for additional information.

For more information about the City of Allen vaccine registration process, Collin County residents may visit the city website at: https://www.cityofallen.org/2202/COVID-19-Vaccination or call (214) 509-4333.

For more information about the Baylor Scott & White vaccine registration process, Collin County residents may visit the BSW website at: https://www.bswhealth.com/covid-vaccine or call (844) 279-8222.

Through week seven, DSHS has allocated 46,175 vaccine doses to Collin County. Based on the county’s population, Collin County officials have calculated that the allocation should be 72,465 vaccine doses, a deficiency of 26,290 doses. Among all 254 Texas counties, only Denton County (27,564) has a greater vaccine deficiency. Thursday morning, Collin County Judge Chris Hill spoke to DSHS officials about the inequity of doses being allocated to Collin County. DSHS officials acknowledged that Collin County and Denton County have not been provided an equitable share of vaccine doses. He also reported that DSHS stated that they will not correct the deficiency until late February at the earliest. According to his calculations, by late February, the deficiencies in Collin County and Denton County will have increased to 45,000 for each county. DSHS advises that the vaccine will not be readily available for most Texans until late spring or early summer 2021. Visit the Texas DSHS COVID-19 Vaccine Provider Locations map to see providers near you who have received the vaccine, or visit the Collin County website for additional updates, as they become available. (Links below, in "other helpful links")

Regarding Vaccine Allocation to Collin County:

Collin County also provides a vaccine "Wait List Lookup Tool" for residents to confirm their wait list registration.  We will be adding a feature to the dashboard to show the portion of the list currently being served. Please be advised that in order to look up your name, you must enter your name EXACTLY as you entered it to register. This is necessary to protect your privacy, and to not return multiple matches.  Here's the link: https://apps2.collincountytx.gov/Forms/VaccineRequest-Search 

NOTE: If you're on our vaccine wait list and are able get vaccinated from another provider (doctor, pharmacy, hospital OR a vaccine hub not using our wait list), you can ask to be removed from our wait list by emailing [email protected]. 

Unfortunately, there is still an extreme shortage of vaccine, and there are still frontline workers and other Phase 1A people waiting to be vaccinated. When the state decided to change direction and open up to Phase 1B, it increased this shortage by orders of magnitude, and signaled to at least 30% of Texas' population to get in line (and even to have an expectation that they would be vaccinated immediately).

Sadly, the inventory of available vaccine supply is still just trickling in, and this has exacerbated the enormous discrepancy between available supply and exploding demand. The manufacturers are getting it out as quickly as possible, and the situation is very much like testing was at the beginning of the pandemic - severely limited. Please know that the County is on top of the situation, monitoring constantly, and we continue to adjust our approach as the state's response evolves. Additionally, we will continue to mobilize and innovate as we identify new opportunities to deliver for our citizens.
 

Want to help with COVID-19 response? You don't have to be a doctor, nurse or EMT. Those are great, too, but the Medical Reserve Corps (MRC) will be happy to enlist your help, and takes all kinds of assistance. Check out the link here: https://www.collincountytx.gov/mrc/Pages/default.aspx