NEW YORK (WCBS 880) — Mayor Bill de Blasio on Monday said he is hoping New York City will “see an intensive speed up in January” after the city reported a disappointing pace of COVID-19 vaccinations.
Last month, the mayor said he had set a goal for the city to get 1 million residents vaccinated by the end of January. On Monday, he doubled down on that pledge, saying New York City will move towards a “24/7” approach in distributing the vaccine.
“Now is the time to sprint,” the mayor said during his briefing.
The city had previously taken a slow and steady approach in vaccinating residents, but the mayor says he wants to move towards getting as many people vaccinated as possible.
“In the next few weeks, I want to see us start to vaccinate educators and school staff. I want to see us vaccinate first responders of all kinds – cops, firefighters – across the spectrum,” the mayor said. “We are focused right now on our healthcare heroes, we're focused on nursing homes, but during the month of January, we need to expand those categories.”
The city will need permission from the state to expand vaccine eligibility, but New York State Health Commissioner Dr. Dave Chokshi says the state is already looking to increase vaccine capacity.
“Our plan is to double the current capacity of about 125 sites where New Yorkers are being vaccinated to date to at least 250 sites by the end of the month,” he said.
De Blasio noted the initial weeks of the vaccine's administration had been necessarily careful and slow, but noted that more than 110,000 vaccine doses have been distributed so far.
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