CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The West Virginia National Guard and the Joint Interagency Task Force for COVID-19 Vaccines (JIATF) helped receive and ship the state’s allocation of COVID-19 vaccines, leading to more than 117,130 West Virginians getting vaccinated.
Since the start of the vaccination process in West Virginia, interagency partners, including local health departments, community health centers, hospitals, pharmacies, and many others, have assisted in the administration of 100,696 first doses of COVID-19 vaccine while completing the two-dose vaccination process for 16,434 West Virginians.
The state is ranked one of the top states in the nation for total vaccines administered per 100,000 residents and seventh overall for the percent of the population tested.
For more than 300 days, the West Virginia National Guard has supported the state’s COVID-19 response, completing 3,727 missions. Almost 550 members of the WVNG are on duty.
This past week, the WVNG received two new pieces of equipment to increase in-state manufacturing of personal protective equipment (PPE). The Guard is now making medial hair bonnets, foot coverings, gowns, face masks and shields. This additional capability to source PPE internally will help ease the supply chain strain for West Virginia.
Guard members helped distribute 149,780 ancillary kits that accompany vaccine doses. The Task Force has also been proactive in ordering and assembling additional kits to speed up vaccine distribution, as the vaccine and kits ship separately. Along with vaccinations, the WVNG assisted in the testing of 94,545 residents this past week.