COVID Vaccine Sites ‘Grossly Underused:’ Essex County Executive

ESSEX COUNTY, NJ — Essex County has seen big praise for its COVID-19 vaccine program, which recently gave out a landmark 100,000th first dose. But the county's top official says his region – and perhaps all of New Jersey – has the capacity to do more than twice as many shots.

All they need, he said, is supply.

On Tuesday, Essex County Executive Joseph DiVincenzo Jr. urged Gov. Phil Murphy and Congress members who represent the area to get the Biden administration to provide more supply to New Jersey and raise the county’s weekly allocation of shots for its five vaccination centers.

Each center has been seeing a huge demand for shots, which far exceeds the available doses, officials have said.

• See related article: How To Get COVID Vaccines In Essex County (More People Eligible)

Essex County has rolled out an online schedule that allows residents to see if any appointments are available at its vaccination centers. But appointments have been disappearing off the tracker nearly as soon as they're posted, leaving many residents checking back daily with no success.

See the website here.

“We have proven our vaccination initiatives to be efficient and effective, yet our weekly allotment has remained at 12,000 doses,” DiVincenzo charged. “If we received more doses, we could put shots in even more arms.”

“I believe our sites are grossly underutilized,” the county executive continued. “We have the capacity to be vaccinating between 25,000 and 30,000 people per week – if only we had more doses.”

The supply and demand problem has federal roots, according to DiVincenzo; if New Jersey received a larger allocation from the U.S. government, then more could be earmarked for Essex County.

Meanwhile, the county is doing what it can to best use the doses it has, he added. Those efforts include:

• Busing 700 senior citizens from Newark, Orange, East Orange, Irvington, Bloomfield and Belleville to its five vaccination centers each week
• Hosting mobile vaccination sites in churches, senior buildings and community centers in Newark, Orange, East Orange and Irvington
• Hosting “pop up” vaccination sites in homeless shelters, boarding homes and social service agencies to provide vaccinations to homeless residents, special needs residents and domestic violence victims
• Scheduling special vaccination appointment times for teachers and support staff from public, private, parochial and charter schools to be vaccinated
• Partnering with mayors and local health officials to identify and vaccinate homebound residents

“We need as many organizations as possible working with government to get our residents vaccinated,” DiVincenzo said. “But what we really need the most is more vaccines.”

DiVincenzo’s letter, which was sent to Murphy, U.S. Senators Cory Booker and Robert Menendez, and U.S. Representatives Donald Payne Jr., Mikie Sherrill, Albio Sires and Tom Malinowski, can be seen below.

Essex County has been one of the hardest-hit in New Jersey during the pandemic. As of Tuesday, it has seen 73,978 cumulative cases of the virus. Only Bergen County, with 76,870 cases, and Middlesex County, with 74,235, have seen more.

Essex County has also seen 2,478 confirmed deaths linked to the disease, the most in the entire state, according to the New Jersey Department of Health.

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