Van Hollen asks Biden to put mass vaccine focus on first doses

U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., is asking the Biden administration to shift the COVID-19 mass vaccination push to first doses. Van Hollen and U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., have written the White House asking for a federal focus on first doses. “As a threat rises from new disease variants, we write to request your consideration of a new strategy to maximize the population receiving the COVID-19 vaccine in the near term,” Van Hollen and Heinrich say in a March 1 letter. “We encourage you to explore deploying existing second doses as first doses and rely on growing real-time inventory to cover future follow-on booster shots.”