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A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advisory panel earlier this month recommended that front-line healthcare workers and residents of long-term nursing care facilities be given the highest priority for getting the vaccine. But there won't be enough doses initially for all of the people in the the CDC's highest tier and the federal government didn't recommend either group go first, leaving it to the states to decide. Given how quickly COVID-19 spreads through a nursing home, representatives for the sector would like to see the doses go there first. (Johnson and Christ, 12/10)

Health care workers and residents in long-term care facilities will likely be among the first to have access to a COVID-19 vaccine. Who's next in line could be from among a pool of essential workers, and educators hope they're at the top of that list. "I would love enough vaccines to be available so teachers and educators and education support personnel could be moved up on the list as quickly as possible," Michael Lubelfeld, superintendent of the North Shore School District 112 in Highland Park, Illinois, told ABC News. (Deliso, 12/11)

As a COVID-19 vaccine is on the cusp of rolling out in the United States, frontline airline workers are campaigning to move up in the vaccine priority line. More than a dozen airline and aviation unions asked the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices in a Thursday letter to prioritize "frontline aviation workers in the next phase of vaccine allocation (Phase 1b) after health workers and residents in long term facilities in your upcoming recommendations to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)." (Thompson, 12/10)

KHN: Farmworkers, Firefighters And Flight Attendants Jockey For Vaccine Priority

With front-line health workers and nursing home residents and staff expected to get the initial doses of COVID vaccines, the thornier question is figuring out who goes next. The answer will likely depend on where you live. While an influential federal advisory board is expected to make its recommendations later this month, state health departments and governors will make the call on who gets access to a limited number of vaccines this winter. (Bluth and Galewitz, 12/11)

Operation Warp Speed officials have already told states how many doses of the initial allotment of vaccines they will get, and will begin shipping them out to 636 locations once EUAs are issued, according to Operation Warp Speed CEO Gen. Gustave Perna. Once the vaccines are shipped to the states, they will be administered in a variety of settings, from hospitals to nursing homes to pharmacies to special vaccination sites. But the federal government is responsible for only part of the effort to get the vaccine into people's arms. States and a network of health departments, hospitals, doctors' offices, and pharmacies will play the biggest role. (Dall, 12/10)

KHN: Supply Is Limited And Distribution Uncertain As COVID Vaccine Rolls Out 

High stakes and big challenges await as the U.S. prepares to roll out vaccines against COVID-19, with front-line health care workers and vulnerable nursing home residents recommended as the top priority. Doses could be on their way very soon. An independent advisory committee to the Food and Drug Administration on Thursday gave a green light to the first vaccine candidate, made by Pfizer in conjunction with the German company BioNTech — a recommendation expected to be approved by the agency within days. The committee is scheduled to consider a second candidate, made by Moderna, Dec. 17. (Appleby, 12/11)

Around 70 percent of health-care workers worldwide are women, meaning many are on the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic and, in theory, toward the front of the line for a vaccine shot as they begin to be distributed. But there’s a catch: Vaccination programs from Russia to the United Kingdom are excluding women who are pregnant, breastfeeding or planning for a pregnancy because the vaccine candidates were not clinically tested on these populations as part of their initial trials. (Berger, 12/10)

American women, who traditionally make most of the healthcare decisions in their families, are more wary than men of the new, rapidly developed COVID-19 vaccines, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll, presenting a potential challenge to efforts to immunize the public. The Dec. 2-8 national opinion survey showed that 35% of women said they were “not very” or “not at all” interested in getting a vaccine, an increase of 9 points from a similar poll conducted in May when vaccines were still being developed. (Kahn and Beasley, 12/11)

KHN: KHN On The Air This Week 

KHN senior correspondent JoNel Aleccia discussed the demand for COVID-19 vaccines with Newsy’s “Morning Rush” on Thursday. ... KHN Editor-in-Chief Elisabeth Rosenthal discussed COVID vaccine distribution and its potential hiccups with RNN TV’s “Richard French Live” on Tuesday. The exchange starts at about the three-minute mark. (12/11)