Amid a tense dispute between the European Union and AstraZeneca over delayed vaccine delivery, Germany is preparing to reduce the pace of its inoculation campaign for the next 10 weeks.
Health Minister Jens Spahn warned Thursday there were not enough shots of the already approved Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines to stay on schedule.
"We will still have at least 10 tough weeks with a shortage of vaccine," he tweeted.
Appointments to get the jab are being canceled across the country because supplies are already running short.
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One vaccination center in Wiesbaden reported inoculating only 288 people, despite having the capacity to see 1,500 patients each day.
"Our wish is of course to vaccinate more people, but this requires the vaccine being available," said Oliver Franz, a spokesman for Wiesbaden Public Health System.
An emergency summit, which will include pharmaceutical companies, regional leaders, and federal ministers, is scheduled for Monday.
German media have been critical of the shortage and Bild, the nation's top-selling newspaper, called it a "scandal."
State premiers say they are feeling the heat from constituents and have demanded more answers from Berlin.
Epidemiological indicators suggest the 13 weeks of lockdown measures in Germany are beginning to show "a positive trend." The national reproduction, or R, number for COVID-19 has returned to levels last recorded in October.
However, hospitalizations for the virus are still higher than during the first wave – and many patients are on ventilators.
"I worry every day whether we have enough people to do justice to these patients," said Miriam Bloessner, a nurse in Berlin.
Bloessner and her colleagues once saw vaccines as the light at the end of the tunnel, but as Germany struggles to give as many jabs as promised, she is worried what the spring will hold.