DETROIT (WXYZ) — An update from Henry Ford Health officials shows there’s still way more demand than supply of COVID vaccines.
More are on the way and systems continue to ramp up to eventually inoculate millions of people here in metro Detroit.
Henry Ford along with the other half dozen health systems continue to book appointments for vaccines through their websites and telephone centers.
People are anxious and Henry Ford’s Chief Clinical Officer Dr. Adnan Munkarah knows it saying during a Zoom news conference, “We would love to give everyone the vaccine within the next week.”
Henry Ford COO and President of Healthcare Operations Bob Riney also says scaling up the system and moving personnel is underway adding, “this is the largest vaccination effort of its kind that has been every undertaken.”
The vaccines continue to flow into metro Detroit but not quickly enough to satisfy demand.
Right now they have to be given in two doses three weeks apart, “which means making several million vaccination appointments over the next several months,” Riney says.
“It’s going to take us many months to get the numbers of vaccines into people to make sure that we have enough herd immunity to protect our world community and get back to some normalcy,” Dr Munkarah says.
In the meantime, he says don’t let your guard down, wear a mask, practice social distancing, and frequently wash your hands.