St. Luke’s Processing Thousands of Vaccine Doses to Ship Out Statewide

The hospital is one of the medical facilities designated as hubs, shipping to five different smaller "spokes" across the state.

DULUTH, Minn.- St. Luke’s in Duluth is sharing how they process their vaccine shipments.

The hospital is one of the medical facilities designated as hubs, shipping to five different smaller “spokes” across the state.

St. Luke’s processes 1,120 doses per flat of vaccines, stored at negative 60 to negative 80 degrees Celsius.

Pharmaceutical staff at St. Luke’s says it’s a complex system. “It’s a process,” said Abby Fox, one of the hospital’s Pharmaceutical Buyers.

“And everybody’s working together to try to communicate as best as possible to make sure that we’re not diluting too many vials and we have just the right amount so the right amount of patients is getting vaccinated,” she said.

It can be taxing she says, but it’s also a never-seen-before effort.

“We’re all really busy just doing our standard jobs, it’s been a lot to take on but it does feel really cool to be part of it,” said Fox.

Each vial of Pfizer vaccine contains about six doses when thawed and diluted from frozen.