After receiving numerous complaints from citizens the big question remains! Why aren’t first round doses of the COVID-19 vaccine available in Cherokee County to those who are eligible to receive it? 

WEIS Radio News reached out to Cherokee County EMA Director Shawn Rogers to see if he had any insight. Director Rogers states, right now Walmart is the only place in Cherokee County offering first round doses and according to the pharmacy they can only administer 10 first round doses per day. Walmart Pharmacy says their allocation, which comes from a federal program, got cut from what they were initially expected to receive.  

As medical offices and pharmacies around Cherokee County continue to wait for additional doses so does Floyd-Cherokee Medical Center. Some medical offices had to cancel appointments due to their supply being cut off with no explanation. The Alabama Department of Public Health has been conducting first round vaccinations at 8 mass vaccination sites around the state. Those sites were opened in the 8 most populous cities with those being; Anniston, Birmingham, Huntsville, Montgomery, Tuscaloosa, Selma, Dothan, and Mobile. 

Director Rogers says “while this is good for the citizens of those cities, it’s not so good for counties like Cherokee. I’ve asked questions and can’t seem to get any answers. It almost seems like our doses were taken from us to supply the 8 mega sites”. 

After looking at other news stories published by different media outlets it appears the 8 mega sites were a response from the Alabama Department of Public Health as those sites came on the heels of some negative nationwide attention, of which ranked Alabama as one of the worst states in the U.S. for vaccine distribution. It looks like the mega sites were an attempt to boost vaccination numbers to help Alabama’s image while in the national spotlight. Before vaccinations began at the mega sites, medical offices, the hospital, and pharmacies in Cherokee County were able to vaccinate our citizens without issue. Once the vaccinations started at the mega sites, the availability of first round doses came to a halt for those administering the vaccine across North Alabama. 

According to Director Rogers, Cherokee County went from administering the vaccine at 7 locations to just 1 and there’s other medical offices in the county that have placed orders to begin administering vaccines but those offices have not been able to receive any doses at all.

The attached press release was issued by the Alabama Department of Public Health on February 12th outlining how many people were vaccinated at the 8 mass vaccination clinics during the week ending on February 11th. If you total the numbers during that week it equals 66,513 people. The population of Cherokee County is roughly 26,000. That’s 2 ½ times the population of Cherokee County which mean a lot of people in other areas around the state, especially in the rural areas where vaccine availability is already limited,  could’ve had access to the vaccine 

WEIS Radio News will continue to seek answers and provide updates as we learn more.