Hilton Head, Coastal Carolina hospitals cancel 300 appointments due to vaccine shortage
Hilton Head Hospital and Coastal Carolina Hospital have canceled about 300 appointments for people wanting a COVID vaccine.
The cancellations are a result of a statewide vaccine shortage, according to a news release Monday morning.
On Friday night, Beaufort Memorial Hospital announced it was canceling more than 6,000 appointments because it received only 450 doses of the vaccine instead of the 2,000 expected.
All appointments scheduled to take place before noon Wednesday at Hilton Head Hospital or Coastal Carolina Hospital will be rescheduled. Patients will be contacted by hospital representatives and do not need to do anything, the news release says.
Appointments scheduled for noon Wednesday, all day Thursday or all day Friday will remain the same. Patients whose appointments are canceled will be prioritized for the next round of vaccines.
Hilton Head Hospital or Coastal Carolina Hospital, both part of Hilton Head Regional Healthcare, expect administer more than 1,500 vaccine doses this week. The hospitals’ call center is open from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily at 843-689-7282 for those with scheduling questions. Vaccine and coronavirus testing information also is available at hiltonheadregional.com.
Both the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and the Moderna vaccine use recommended two-dose regimens.
The canceled appointments come on the heels of a statewide push to open up vaccine appointments to people over 70 years old after an announcement by Gov. Henry McMaster last Monday, and a surge in fatalities reported in the state.
The Washington Post recently reported that, while Health and Human Services Secretary Alex M. Azar had said the federal government would start to release all second doses held in a stockpile to speed up the nation’s distribution, there was actually no reserve.
Not including third-party providers, more than 162,900 appointments to get Pfizer doses had been scheduled statewide, according to DHEC data.
