Rep. Ruiz calls on state to deliver Monkeypox vaccine to Coachella Valley
Congressman Raul Ruiz, M.D. (CA-36) is calling on the California Health and Human Services Agency to allocate additional monkeypox vaccines for the City of Palm Springs and the surrounding Coachella Valley.
In a letter to California Health and Human Services Agency Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly, Dr. Ruiz urged the State to prioritize the area due to its high-risk factors, such as a disproportionately high immunocompromised population that is over twice as large as Los Angeles County.
"While major cities in California have vaccinated their highest-risk citizens and begun vaccinating broader groups, Palm Springs remains unable to vaccinate even those at highest risk," Dr. Ruiz wrote in the letter. "If California's vaccine distribution strategy continues to overlook the Palm Springs area, monkeypox will spread at even higher rates and endanger more populations nationwide."
Given the nationwide shortage of the monkeypox vaccine, California officials are using measurements such as population density and positivity rates to allocate vaccines to regions across the state. However, these measurements overlook high-risk yet low-density cities like Palm Springs. Riverside County as a whole has only received 1,000 vaccine doses, which falls short of the 10,000 experts say the County would need to cover the area's high-risk populations.
Dr. Ruiz's letter is a continuation of his push to get more vaccines for the region, advocating directly to the Director of the Centers of Disease Control and California Governor Newsom.