By Ray King
Arkansas is currently ranked in the number of people who have been vaccinated for COVID-19, according to Governor Asa Hutchinson.
According to the Governor, of the supply the state received last week, 92 percent of it was in the arms of state residents within 48 hours.
In the last 24 hours, Hutchinson said Arkansas has received 72,000 doses of the vaccine, with half of that being designated for an initial dose and the remainder for the second dose. He said one of the problems has been to get a consistent supply since Arkansas, like other states, doesn’t know how much vaccine they are going to get each week.
He went on to say that there have been questions about why the state doesn’t just set up one mass clinic to vaccinate as many people as possible.
“If we did that, we would run out by 9 a.m.,” He said.
Arkansas has received 410,000 doses of the vaccine so far and Hutchinson said 227,074 doses have been administered so far by state health agencies like hospitals and the State Health Department.
The Governor said he would participate in a conference call with federal officials later in the day Tuesday where he hoped to find out more about when the state would receive additional vaccine and how much it would get.
Over the past 24 hours, 2,485 new cases of COVID-19 were reported, bringing the state’s total to 287,187. Of those, 18,158 are active cases. There have been 4,690 deaths since the Pandemic began.
He said there have been no reports of any of the new virus strains in the state so far.
