The Baker-Polito Administration’s management failures in implementing COVID vaccinations are clearly evident in its lack of clear goals, a failure to learn from past mistakes, little apparent sense of urgency, a failure to embrace best practices seen in other states, and a lack of flexibility. With the vaccinations, it has made the same mistake of focusing on hospitals and ignoring long-term care facilities that it made in the spring, which led to MA having one of the worst death rates in long-term care facilities in the country. When hospitals and universities have had extra doses of vaccines available, direction from the administration on how to use them has been confusing and frustrating. (https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/01/28/nation/while-some-struggle-get-vaccine-colleges-hospitals-face-different-problem-what-do-with-surplus-doses)
The state’s data and tracking systems are inefficient. The Baker-Polito Administration had promised local health departments an early fall delivery of a new system for automating the paper-based transmission of data on vaccinations to the state. It finally provided the system in early January. In addition, the immunization tracking system does not efficiently record the number of doses on-hand that are committed to future vaccination appointments. (https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/01/23/metro/massachusetts-lagging-most-other-states-covid-19-vaccination-rollout/)