RICHMOND, Va. -- The Virginia Department of Health (VDH) announced Wednesday they expected to receive 370,000 doses of the coronavirus vaccine in the Commonwealth by the end of the year.
This comes as thousands of healthcare workers had already received their vaccines, and administration of vaccines for long-term care facilities was underway.
Director of the Division of Immunization, Christy Gray, said Virginia had been working to implement a successful vaccination program across the Commonwealth.
She said as of Wednesday morning, Virginia had received approximately 285,000 doses from two manufacturers.
So far, she said 54,000 doses had been administered to people in the Commonwealth.
Health districts had been working with healthcare systems to plan for how to provide the vaccine for people in Group 1A which included healthcare workers and long-term care facilities. Gray said they expected vaccinations to be underway in assisted living facilities in the coming weeks.
She said most had opted to receive those vaccinations onsite through a partnership with CVS and Walgreen's vaccination team.
In the meantime, Virginia was awaiting recommendations on who should be in priority groups 1B and 1C. Gray said Virginia's Unified Command expected to get a recommendation for final approval later in the week.
Gray also provided an update on the vaccination dashboard that went live last week. It included two tabs with vaccine summary information and demographics.
The site will be updated daily to keep the public informed about the number of COVID vaccines distributed and administered in Virginia.
She said the number of doses of COVID vaccine administered displayed on the dashboard would always be behind the actual number of doses administered. The data was coming from the Virginia Immunization Information System. Providers across the Commonwealth entered that information in VIIS.
Information entered in VIIS would allow providers to know when to give the second dose to an individual and what type of vaccine to give. Providers could use information in VIIS to give individuals proof of their COVID vaccine as well.