State says 6,300 people were underdosed at Oakland Coliseum - SF Gate

The California Department of Public Health said Wednesday that a vaccine issue at the Oakland Coliseum may have resulted in up to 6,300 people receiving smaller doses of the Pfizer vaccine than recommended.

The department said despite this finding, people who were underdosed do not need to do anything besides get a second shot.

"While the recommended dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine is 0.3 ml, the CDC has determined that any dosage of 0.15 ml or larger is safe and does not require the dose to be repeated to protect people against COVID-19," Ali Bay, a spokesperson for the Department of Public Health, wrote in an email. "In this instance, some individuals may have received a dose of 0.22 ml, which is well within the range outlined by the CDC."

The less-than-recommended doses were the result of human error, the state said. The state is alerting people who received the vaccine Sunday, Feb. 28, after 4:30 p.m. and Monday, March 1, between 8 a.m. and 3 p.m. they may have may gotten slightly less than the optimal dose.

"The dosing difference was corrected by on-site staff on Monday afternoon, and CDPH has implemented additional training and quality assurance steps as a preventative measure," Bay wrote in her email.

The state is notifying those who may have received the smaller dose by email or mailed letter. "In consultation with vaccine experts from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Pfizer, we have determined that some individuals who received a vaccine during this time may have received slightly less than the recommended dose," the letter read.

This news comes after two anonymous sources last week told KTVU thousands of vaccine recipients were underdosed and the state said the claims were false.

At the time, Dr. John Swartzberg, a professor of infectious disease at UC Berkeley, told SFGATE if there were people at the Oakland Coliseum who received a smaller dose, "As a physician and knowing how vaccines work, I’m not alarmed by that and I think my patient would be protected, but I want to hear that from people who know more than I do. I would have the FDA scientists and Pfizer advise what we should be doing as they’re going to know what we should do."

Editor's note: This story was updated on March 8 at 7 p.m. to clarify that the dosage error was caused by human error and not the syringe. The story was also updated to make clear that the state notified 6,300 people who may have been underdosed. All of those people who were contacted may not have received the slightly less dose.

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