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Thawed Vaccine Leads Indiana County To Offer Shot To Public

PATRICK T. FALLON / AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

FRANKLIN, Ind. (AP) — A shipment of COVID-19 vaccines that arrived in a central Indiana county already thawed prompted officials to briefly offer the shots to people not yet eligible for the vaccine under state guidelines. The Johnson County Health Department and Johnson Memorial Hospital received 957 already thawed Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccines last week. That vaccine can only be stored thawed for up to five days under U.S. Food and Drug Administration guidance. County health department director Betsy Swearingen tells the Daily Journal that the eligibility window was briefly widened but most of the thawed vaccines were given to people age 50 and older, and those with medical conditions.