Milwaukee County vaccine supply rising, appointments available
MILWAUKEE - Milwaukee County officials are encouraging people to get the COVID-19 vaccine now more than ever.
After months of the vaccine supply being a constraint for the city and county, officials said it is no longer a factor in getting shots in arms.
"It’s literally thousands a day that we have access to now, and a lot of the increase came from FEMA’s decision to have the site here," said Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett.
While the supply is there, so is the number of available appointments, raising the question: Is the demand there?
"Only one-third of our county has received at least one dose, it would suggest that there’s still many people out there in Milwaukee County that want to be vaccinated," said Dr. Ben Weston with the Milwaukee County Office of Emergency Management.
But what is causing the gap between supply and available appointments?
"The supply has so dramatically increased," Barrett said, "and we’ve been able to keep up with the demand."
County officials said 20% of Milwaukee's population falls into the "wait and see" category. With tens of thousands of doses coming to the city each week, and cases on the rise, health officials are pushing for more people to get vaccinated.
"We saw a substantial downtrend in the number of vaccines distributed in the county, so we’ll certainly wait for lingering data to arrive before making conclusions there," Weston said. "This is absolutely not the time to pull back on the number of individuals seeking out or being vaccinated."
Vaccine registration is available online -- visit vaccinate.wi.gov/en-US.
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