TRENTON, NJ – New Jersey officials on Monday confirmed that two of the state’s new “Vaccine Mega Sites” have been forced to close because there were no vaccine doses to give. The shortage of vaccines has been the Biden administration’s first major problem as doses of the vaccine have been in short supply for more than a week, officials said.
The Rowan College and Meadowlands Racetrack sites were closed on Monday. Rowan is expected to open on Tuesday if it receives its allocated vaccine shipment.
The state received 1,000,000 total doses. 565,000 have been administered and is averaging 25,000 doses per day. At that rate, it will take 160 days to vaccinate 4,000,000 people in a state of 8,000,000.
“So as we have said many times before, we know that there is far more demand for vaccines at this moment than we have an actual supply of doses available to us,” Governor Phil Murphy said of the Shortage. “We continue to ensure an equitable distribution across our state and to ensure that in addition to our frontline healthcare workers and first responders, that those residents at highest risk, whether due to age or medical history and condition or both, are vaccinated first.”