The overall dose count and number of county providers selected for allocations is lower this week than last, a trend mirrored at the state level and which the Texas Department of State Health Services attributed in part to smaller shipments of the new Johnson & Johnson vaccine and a shift in operations at some of the state's largest vaccination sites.
"The decrease follows a large amount of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine coming to the state. Smaller amounts of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine will be available for the next two weeks as production increases," DSHS said in a March 12 statement. "Additionally, the federally-supported sites in Arlington, Dallas and Houston have finished their three-week cycle of first doses and will be administering second doses for the next three weeks."
Both Montgomery County vaccination hub sites, managed by CHI St. Luke's Health-The Woodlands Hospital and the Lone Star Family Health Center, were each tapped for identical allocations—8,190 doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for the St. Luke's operation and 2,500 Moderna doses for Lone Star's—as in the previous two weeks. More information and registration details for both sites may be found by phone or online, via 936-202-2060 or www.stlukeshealth.org/montgomerycountyvaccine for the St. Luke's hub site and 936-523-5230 or www.lonestarvaccine.com for Lone Star's.
Additional county providers with vaccine allocations this week include Houston Methodist The Woodlands Hospital, which had nearly 6,000 doses reserved, and Kelsey-Seybold's clinics in Conroe and Porter each with 100-dose shipments.
Through 14 weeks of Texas' vaccine distribution efforts, more than 200,000 first and second COVID-19 vaccine doses have been allocated to Montgomery County's hub sites and other providers. According to DSHS, over 135,000 of those doses had been administered as of March 16 with 85,656 people receiving at least one dose and 51,339 people fully vaccinated.
