NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - More than 2,400 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine in Tennessee's most populous county went to waste over the past month while local officials sat on tens of thousands of shots that they thought had already gone into arms, the state's top health official announced Tuesday.
The finding comes after the Department of Health launched an investigation over the weekend into an initial report that recent severe winter storms caused 1,000 doses to be tossed in Shelby County, which encompasses Memphis.
But Health Commissioner Lisa Piercey on Tuesday revealed that the problems were far more widespread. She said issues dating back to Feb. 3 ranged from multiple incidents of spoiled doses, an excessive vaccine inventory, insufficient record-keeping and a lack of a formal process for managing soon-to-expire vaccines. A federal investigation is also expected.
As a result, Shelby County's local health department will temporarily no longer be allowed to allocate the vaccine. Instead, Memphis city officials, hospitals, clinics and other pharmacies throughout the county will handle the distribution. Meanwhile, the physical management of the vaccine will now be handled by hospital partners.
Piercey said she was still unsure how the county built up 30,000 excessive vaccine doses in their inventory. She told reporters that the county had originally blamed the problem on a lag in reporting, but she deferred specific questions to the local health department.
Piercey added that the 2,400 wasted doses occurred over seven incidents. Roughly half occurred before last week's storms, which caused several states to face delays in giving out vaccinations.
Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris announced that the county's site manager had since been fired.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 11.2% of Tennessee's overall population has received a single dose of the vaccine and 5.4% has received a second dose.
Separately, earlier this month, officials in Knox County announced that 975 doses had been accidentally thrown away by someone who thought they were throwing out dry ice. The state has also launched an investigation into that incident.