Tulare County sees boost in COVID vaccinations as more doses arrive in Central Valley
More COVID-19 vaccines are arriving in the Central Valley as part of California's new metric to distribute doses equitably in some of the state's most vulnerable neighborhoods.
FRESNO, Calif. -- More COVID-19 vaccines are arriving in the Central Valley as part of California's new effort to distribute doses equitably in some of the state's most vulnerable neighborhoods.
Gov. Gavin Newsom visited Earlimart in Tulare County on Monday, highlighting the county's efforts to boost residents' access to vaccines and increase doses brought to the area under the new plan.
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Tulare County is one of those vulnerable areas identified by the state. Local health officials said the county saw a 114% increase in the number of vaccines made available to the community recently. They expect another 40% increase in doses this week.
RELATED: Vulnerable neighborhoods in CA to get more COVID-19 vaccine doses, check your zip code here
The county has set up around 45 vaccine sites across the area. So far, 62,000 residents in Tulare County have received at least one dose of the vaccine, which represents 12.8% of the population. Thirty-two percent of those doses were administered to educators, and 5% were administered to farmworkers.
Local health officials said the number of farmworkers inoculated is too low, but they're hopeful the new equity plan will help boost those vaccinations.
Gov. Newsom acknowledged that there is still work to be done to distribute vaccines evenly. He said the main constraint has been the supply of vaccines, but that is expected to improve in the future.
"We're going to see supply increase significantly over the course of the next number of weeks. (The) light truly is bright at the end of this tunnel," the governor said. Newsom said California is expecting a shipment of around 320,000 Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccines this week.
More than 200,000 educators have been vaccinated across the state, health officials announced Monday.
The governor also teased that "likely another dozen counties" would be moving into a less restrictive tier on Tuesday.
RELATED: Fully vaccinated people can gather without masks, CDC says
As of Monday, more than 10.6 million COVID-19 vaccines had been administered in the state.
California's positivity rate remains low at 2.2% over the last two weeks.
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