U.S. COVID-19 shots up 8pc in past week to 3 million a day on average

WASHINGTON: The United States is administering about 3 million COVID-19 vaccine doses per day on average over the past week, up 8pc over the previous seven-day average, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said on Wednesday.

Vaccine supply has increased significantly in the United States in recent weeks as Johnson & Johnson has begun making millions of doses of its recently authorized shots.

Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna have also recently boosted their vaccine production capacity.

U.S. President Joe Biden has doubled his goal for shots administered in his first 100 days in office from 100 million to 200 million and urged states to begin giving shots to all adults by mid-April.

Still, daily U.S. cases of novel coronavirus are averaging 63,000 over the past seven days, up 2.3pc from the previous seven-day average, Walensky told reporters at a White House briefing.

White House COVID-19 adviser Andy Slavitt said on Wednesday that the U.S. government is expanding its community health center program, which it set up in recent weeks to help get vaccines into underserved communities.

Walensky said that the CDC has identified a number of COVID-19 outbreaks tied to youth sporting events and that communities experiencing high case counts should avoid holding such events. Testing should also happen twice a week, she said.