Editorial: COVID vaccine trends look good, but stay cautious

As vaccine distribution in Hawaii ramps up, so should optimism about our capability to effectively fend off COVID-19 community spread while making needed strides toward significant economic recovery.

Hawaii has the key mechanisms in place to administer upwards of 80,000 doses a week. And during a news briefing this week, Gov. David Ige said the state could easily scale up to maintain a weekly pace of 100,000 shots. Let’s hope so. But holding up progress is vaccine supply, with the weekly allotment from the federal government now at about 40,000 doses.

Overall, the weekly allotment has slowly increased since vaccine distribution started in mid-December, and there’s good reason to expect that allocation will continue to climb, although not as quickly as we would like. Speaking recently on the Honolulu Star-Advertiser’s “Spotlight Hawaii” webcast, state health director Dr. Libby Char said: “The big change will come if and when we get more vaccines on line.”

That’s anxiously expected in early March, when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration weighs in on a promising one-dose candidate from Johnson &Johnson. If approved for distribution — alongside the current, two-dose Moderna and Pfizer vaccines — production of this third one could quickly increase supply.

That forecast is heartening — as is the total count of well over 200,000 shots already administered here, with very few reported adverse reactions. But there are other immediate challenges on the path toward “herd immunity.” For one, according to state Department of Health data posted earlier this week, fewer than 50,000 people had received both doses.

To ensure that second-dose appointments are in the proper time frame, Hawaii Pacific Health is sensibly postponing some already scheduled first-shot appointments and holding off on adding new ones. It’s on us to respond to such hiccups in delivery with due patience and continued adherence to basic public health hygiene protocols, such as mask-wearing and physical distancing.

Even with a surge in vaccine supply, Char said, “We should bear in mind that the vaccination is just … one layer of keeping our community safe.” Among the other layers: sustained testing for infection as well as effective quarantine and isolation practices, and contact tracing efforts.

Given the good news recently of Hawaii’s relatively low coronavirus case counts and positivity rates, public scrutiny focused on contact tracing has receded. However, with confirmation last week of local cases of the variant B1.1.7 — a super-spreading COVID-19 strain first discovered in the United Kingdom — contact tracing could swiftly return to the forefront.

Should highly transmissible variants overwhelm containment strategies, one upshot could be setting the herd immunity bar higher, which could further delay the much-needed economic recovery. On a positive note, Char pointed out that there are nearly 300 contact tracers at the ready in the statewide lineup.

Should vaccine distribution proceed smoothly — with Hawaii essentially dodging variant trouble — the economy could see welcome gains this summer with an influx of vaccinated tourists. At the same time, a new round of federal aid for businesses and individuals could reduce the size of a previously expected slump in statewide income by half or more this year.

That upbeat rough estimation — made by University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization chief Carl Bonham during a recent meeting of the state House Select Committee on COVID-19 — is something to work toward.

“There’s good reason to be optimistic about the overall economy over the next year as we get these vaccines rolled out,” Bonham said.

While still contending with challenges and uncertainty tied to the pandemic, the outlook is getting brighter. But it will take collective effort to keep COVID-19 rates low and businesses aloft, to realize the light at the end of this dark tunnel.