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ID Governor Aims To Make Vaccine Distribution Information More Accessible

Idaho Public TV screenshot

The Covid vaccination window for Idaho senior citizens opens on Monday. And with it comes a move by Governor Brad Little to build trust in the state’s health care providers who are administering those vaccines.

“There are questions about whether vaccines are being administered quickly enough after it arrives in communities across Idaho. Quite frankly, we need a clearer picture," he said.Little signed an executive order Thursday that he says will lead to better reporting of where vaccines go once they arrive in the state.

“My executive order requires health districts and providers to regularly report the number of vaccine doses that have been allocated, how many shots have been given and how many doses they have in inventory, to ensure vaccine is getting out in a timely fashion," he said.

That information will be posted on the state's coronavirus webpages.

Little says some providers have been holding doses for large community-scale vaccination events. He says it’s fine that they want to have events, but they need to use the doses in a more timely manner, seven days, according to his order.

Little says 265,000 Idahoans aged 65 and older will become eligible next week for shots, but it says it will take several weeks to get them all inoculated.

He says Idaho continues to make the case to the federal government that it wants more vaccine. He says the state has been told it will receive about 24,000 doses a week for the next couple of weeks, plus another 18,000 for second doses.