New one-dose COVID vaccines are heading to the Fresno region. Here’s what we know
Some of the first doses of a new vaccine to battle the coronavirus pandemic are expected to begin arriving in the central San Joaquin Valley next week.
The Kings County Department of Public Health announced Thursday that it will receive its first shipment of the vaccine produced by Johnson & Johnson early next week.
Janssen, a division of Johnson & Johnson, received emergency-use authorization for its single-dose vaccine last weekend from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
The first two COVID vaccines that have been deployed in the U.S. — produced by Pfizer BioNTech and Moderna — both require two shots, given either three or four weeks apart.
Speaking in Stockton on Thursday, Gov. Gavin Newsom said the Johnson & Johnson vaccine will be scarce for the time being.
All 21,000 doses sent to California this week were provided directly to mass vaccination sites operated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency in northern and southern California. Next week, he added, the state expects to order up to 320,000 doses.
It’s not clear at this point how much of that volume will be allocated to Fresno County and neighboring Valley counties.
Kings County health officials said that whatever Johnson & Johnson doses they receive will be in addition to allocations of Pfizer and Moderna vaccines that were already expected next week.
“We are very excited to receive shipments of all three vaccines and are thankful to receive the single-dose version, allowing even more people the opportunity to become fully vaccinated without having to return for a second dose,” said Darcy Pickens, Kings County’s assistant director of public health.
Pickens and Joe Prado, community health division manager for the Fresno County Department of Public Health, both said this week that after the initial allocations of the Johnson & Johnson/Janssen vaccine, additional doses won’t be available until the week of March 23 as the company works to ramp up its production.
Thursday case updates
As the Valley awaits having a third vaccine available for residents, counties issued updates Thursday of cases and fatalities attributed to COVID-19. They include:
Fresno County: 108 new cases Thursday, 95,893 to date; eight additional deaths, 1,466 to date. More than half of the deaths reported in Fresno County over the past 12 months have been acknowledged within the past nine weeks since Jan. 1.
Kings County: 28 new cases since Tuesday, 22,119 to date; seven additional deaths, 227 to date. State prisons in Avenal and Corcoran account for more than 7,200 of Kings County’s cases, as well as 17 deaths.
Madera County: 36 new cases, 15,508 to date; no additional deaths, 214 to date.
Mariposa County: No new cases, 395 to date; no additional deaths, seven to date.
Merced County: 61 new cases, 29,325 to date; five additional deaths, 412 to date.
Tulare County: 49 new cases, 48,163 to date; no additional deaths, 768 to date.
Since the region’s first case of coronavirus disease was confirmed on March 6, 2020, more than 211,400 residents have been infected with COVID-19 at some point, whether they experienced symptoms or not.
Of those, almost 3,100 people lost their lives to the disease, according to health officials in the six county central San Joaquin Valley region. Nearly half of those deaths have been reported just since Jan. 1.
This story was originally published March 4, 2021 at 6:02 PM with the headline "New one-dose COVID vaccines are heading to the Fresno region. Here’s what we know."
