BUFFALO, N.Y. — We've heard from government and health leaders locally that their vaccine allocation is getting smaller.
Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz addressed these concerns Thursday evening during a 2 On Your Side Town Hall.
"Two weeks ago we got 7,500 doses from New York State. Last week combined we got 5,500 doses. Unfortunately, this week we got 1,700 doses to work with," Poloncarz said.
To put that in perspective, Poloncarz said before the health department had to cancel clinic appointments, they did more than 1,700 doses in just one day.
"So we pretty much went down from a week's work to a day's worth, and we have no other way of getting doses," he said.
Niagara County public health director Daniel Stapleton touched on a similar issue on Wednesday.
"We're ordering over 3,000 a week. I ordered 3,000 last week. I got 300," Stapleton said. Read that report here.
A spokesperson with Lt. Governor Kathy Hochul's office told 2 On Your Side that they understand local concerns and requests, but the state is still constrained until the federal government provides more doses.
Earlier this week Hochul told reporters she was optimistic with a new administration taking over.
"This could also be a turning point for us," Hochul said.
While the state did not give us a direct answer about when they expect to see an increase in the number of doses coming from the federal government, President Joe Biden has said he is prioritizing vaccine roll out nationwide.
"Our plan starts with running an aggressive, safe and effective vaccination campaign to meet our goal of administering 100 million shots in our first 100 days in office. We're on day one," Biden said on Thursday.
Read the Biden-Harris full COVID-19 plan here.
Learn more about how to make a vaccination appointment here.
Full 2 on Your Side Town Hall segment with Mark Poloncarz below:
