JOHN YANG: This week, the Food and Drug Administration approved this year's updated COVID vaccines, as new highly contagious mutations are making the summer surge significantly bigger than expected.

Many experts say COVID will be around for a while, but it could be as manageable as the flu, especially with widespread vaccination.

But this month, funding runs out for a federal program providing free vaccines to people who either don't have insurance or whose insurance doesn't fully cover vaccines.

Laura Santhanam is PBS Digital health reporter.

Laura, where did this program come from?

I know it's delivered about a million and a half vaccines so far, where did it start?

LAURA SANTHANAM: So the bridge access program was really a response to our nation's fractured and costly health care system.

If you want to get vaccinated for COVID, you go to the place that your health insurance plan covers, you roll up your sleeve, get the vaccine, and then your health insurance and doctor or pharmacist, you know, figure out who pays what later.

But that becomes really problematic for people who don't have health care coverage, or adequate health care coverage, you know, they could be expected to pay $100 per vaccine dose.

And for people who are counting pennies, that is just -- that's they're gambling, they're forced to gamble with their health and still be able to, you know, cover bills.

So what the CDC then decided to do last fall was launch this program, and so it provided free COVID vaccines to uninsured or underinsured adults, and it was largely modeled after the wildly successful vaccines for children's program, which this week actually celebrated its 30th anniversary.

It's prevented hundreds of millions of deaths, tens of millions of hospitalizations, and has been real cost savings for the country, especially for kids.

So this was like the grown up version of that program.

JOHN YANG: Is it as successful as the kids program?

LAURA SANTHANAM: It was supposed to last until this December, but last March, it fell victim to congressional haggling over the nation's budget.

You know, the Department of Health and Human Services ended up taking a $4.3 billion hit.

What that translated to was this program getting cut earlier than expected.

When I spoke with people at the CDC after the program was launched, they were hoping that this would be a prototype for offering more vaccines to adults and just further expanding health equity.

JOHN YANG: And what are state and local health officials doing in response?

LAURA SANTHANAM: They're now forced to scramble when negotiations fell through in Congress that was really setting, you know, state and local health officials on a race against time, and there haven't been a lot of really good answers that have come up in the meantime, some local state health departments have been forced to ask for donations from pharmaceutical companies.

Community Health Centers are still able to offer doses on a sliding fee scale, but again, when you're even a small amount of price tag attached to these vaccine doses can be enough to dissuade someone who's really strapped for cash.

JOHN YANG: So what all the alternatives?

What are the options now for people who either are don't have insurance at all, or are underinsured?

LAURA SANTHANAM: So the program still exists and is in place until August 31 if you're wanting to get a dose, the issue that people are running into, and that has been raised a number of times, is the fact that we don't have the updated 2024, 2025 COVID vaccine dose online yet.

So there's a real chance that people who were relying on this program might miss out on that updated dose, depending on when it's -- when it is made available.

Aside from that, you know, if people are, you know, qualified for Medicare or Medicaid, but haven't been able to get those paper - - their paperwork sorted out.

Now is a good time to try and find a healthcare navigator, contact their local state public health department and try and get a dose that way.

There aren't a lot of good answers, unfortunately, and it appears to be one more case of lessons pandemic era lessons going unlearned, and people who are most vulnerable are paying the price.

JOHN YANG: Laura Santhanam, thank you very much.

LAURA SANTHANAM: Thanks, John.