Honeywell is partnering with North Carolina corporations to introduce Covid vaccines

Honeywell of Charlotte, North Carolina, announced Thursday that it has partnered with a consortium of local companies to accelerate the rollout of Covid-19 vaccines in the state.

The partnership with Atrium Health, Tepper Sports & Entertainment, and Charlotte Motor Speedway sees the establishment of mass vaccination centers across the state to help the state administer 1 million shots by July 4th. Bank of America Stadium, where the Carolina Panthers stadium is located, and Charlotte Motor Speedway will be among the vaccination sites, the group said.

“The pharmaceutical companies have done a great job bringing us these vaccines, and we really need to get them into people’s arms as soon as possible,” said Darius Adamczyk, CEO of Honeywell, in an interview with Mad Money. He added that the group had the support of Roy Cooper, governor of North Carolina.

Adamczyk told CNBC’s Jim Cramer that he recognized the Herculean task of quickly distributing the vaccine and getting it into people’s arms.

“I don’t think a company has all the skills to do this, whether they’re the states, whether they’re medical companies, whether they’re stadium owners,” he said. “To be honest, I felt that Honeywell, being a rather complex company that has lots of tentacles around the world and produces a lot, we could help and bring in our expertise.”

The vaccine rollout has been slower than expected so far. Federal officials had set a goal of vaccinating 20 million people by the end of December and an additional 30 million people by the end of January. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 30.6 million doses have been given to states, but in fact just over 11.1 million have been given.

In North Carolina, more than 268,000 doses have been administered, according to the CDC. The state has a population of around 10.5 million, according to the Census Bureau.

Adamczyk said Thursday he hoped to get the North Carolina mass vaccination sites operational to speed rollout and provide other states with a model of how companies can get involved in the vaccination effort.