Just more than half of U.S. adults have gotten at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose: CDC

[April 19, 2021]  (Reuters) - Just more than half of U.S. adults have now received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose, data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed on Sunday, with nearly 130 million people aged 18 years or more having received their first shot.

That figure makes up about 50.4% of the total adult U.S. population, according to the CDC, marking a milestone for the country that has seen over 560,000 deaths from the pandemic, the highest for any single nation, as the government ramps up the pace of vaccination.

The United States had administered 209,406,814 doses of COVID-19 vaccines in the country as of Sunday morning and distributed 264,505,725 doses, the CDC said on Sunday.

Those figures are up from the 205,871,913 vaccine doses the CDC said had gone into arms by April 17 out of 264,499,715 doses delivered.

The agency said 131,247,546 people had received at least one dose, while 84,263,408 people were fully vaccinated as of Sunday.

Chauphuong Ly Dinh, 50, is given a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccination, in Los Angeles, California, U.S., April 12, 2021. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson

The CDC tally includes two-dose vaccines from Moderna Inc and Pfizer Inc/BioNTech <22UAy.DE>, as well as Johnson & Johnson's one-shot vaccine, as of 6 a.m. EDT (1000 GMT) on Sunday.
 
 On Tuesday, U.S. federal health agencies recommended pausing the use of J&J's COVID-19 vaccine for a few days after six women under age 50 developed rare blood clots after receiving the shot.
 
 A total of 7,779,273 vaccine doses have been administered in long-term care facilities, the agency said.
 
 (Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

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