As recently as mid-December, the Trump administration touted an ambitious goal: 20 million COVID-19 vaccinations by the end of the year.  But now, days before the end of the year, it appears that the actual number of vaccinations will fall significantly short of that mark.  A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention tracker shows only about 2 million people have been vaccinated so far. That figure is likely an undercount, given there is a lag in reporting the data, but it is still well short of 20 million.

Administration officials said Tuesday that they are still on track to allocate 20 million doses to states by the end of the year, but that is different from those doses actually making it all the way into people’s arms.   Experts are pressing he government to ramp up the pace, saying states need more support. The Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed delivers vaccines to the states, but the “last mile” of getting vaccines into people’s arms has largely been left to states to figure out, at a time when state health departments are strapped for cash and overwhelmed