COVID-19: Chapter 7 - Brags, Beats, and Variants

Doesn’t it seem like a day will come when vaccines will be plentiful but people giving shots won’t be? I think Biden realizes they need mass vaccination centers, and I guess they’ve made some progress on that, but this whole idea of almost everyone making an appointment for a shot seems very inefficient. For example, let’s say a pharmacist is scheduling a shot every five minutes for eight hours a day. That’s only 96 shots per day. How fast could he give out 96 shots if he just did them consecutively with people waiting in line?

There are mass vaccination centers. You still make appointments for them. The two aren’t mutually exclusive. The appointments are to keep everyone from showing up at once and forming a huge not socially distant line.

image

8 Likes

30.0. Gets my 1A in PA. Of course can’t find the damn vaccine. My county did 1200 doses last week. 400k registered or something like that.

Wegmans has their link here now. I
Guess it’s F5 all day long.

Rite Aid seems to get some but you have to click through about 4 screens to check each store one at a time. Genius.

1 Like

I think there are better ways to keep everyone from showing up at once. Like if you’re born on the 10th, you can show up for a vaccine on the 10th. There could be some type of formula that’s easily understood that would equalize the distribution process. Right now, they open up for online appointments and its a luckfest trying to get one. Reminds me of the days when I was a DJ and would ask for the 7th caller for a contest, and the phone lines would light up like a Christmas tree. I know supply is limited now, but I’m saying when the supply opens up, the process needs to open up.

That makes sense.

I guess. I just remember seeing pictures from Florida (where they did open it up without appointments), of 80 year olds camped out on line overnight for a shot.

Dude look at other states, we are not even close to that point yet.

I saw a picture like that too from FL, but they were all in their cars.

Not great from a convenience standpoint, but seems like low risk for COVID spread.

Literally give it a a few days. The vaccine allotments from the feds to the states just increased dramatically. Some of the states may be shittier with catching up I guess.

Kind of cool news. I know a couple liberals who were saying they wouldn’t get a vaccine at first just because they were healthy and how fast it came out scared them.

Well they all got theri vaccines. Looks like a lot of them people who are good with vaccines but were scared of how fast it came out are becoming ok with it now because everything seems to be going well.

I think in the end it’ll just be the dumb anti vaxxers who don’t get it. Maybe some Trumpers who are like " only 1% die just the flu " but hopefully they aren’t enough to stop us from getting to 70%

1 Like

I definitely agree with the sentiment of what you are saying, but in NY it is definitely not a total luckfest - there is an element of luck, but much more importantly it just requires a willingness to put in about an hour or two or three of concerted effort. My wife became eligible this morning, and even though we didn’t set up an alarm for 7AM when things opened up, we started trying at 8:30am and by 10am she had an appointment for tomorrow afternoon. A friend with a more serious co-morbidity got right to banging away online and on the phone, and by 8AM had something for tomorrow morning.

That’s to say if you are in NY and you now qualify, do not just try once and give up. If the eligibility website says no appointments are available, keep calling the hotline (1-833-NYS-4-VAX). They will run through the same screening questions as are asked on the website (https://am-i-eligible.covid19vaccine.health.ny.gov/) and if you qualify, they will do a check for appointments near you. They have access to real-time cancellation information that appears not to be available on the web app, and will tell you if there is an appointment or not. If no, call back and see if something opened up. Even if you get one for a while from now, you can continue calling to try to receive an earlier appointment. Pro tip: take the option for a callback rather than sitting on hold for 30 minutes. They are reliable with the callbacks.

With more and more doctors and pharmacies getting access to the vaccine, people that got appointments are the mass vaccination sites are going to be cancelling those appointments. Don’t get discouraged if you call several times, one WILL open up. This has worked for at least a dozen folks that I have direct knowledge of - none have failed though some have had to call ~10 or 15 times.

I hate that folks in other states aren’t having the same experience, but am optimistic that things are going to get better quickly. Peace and love.

Should just let Trump sell Trump-branded Moderna and Pfizer shots for $10 a pop. Would save a lot of fucking lives.

1 Like

This x 100. Appointments are constantly opening up as people cancel, reschedule, etc. If you sit in front of a computer for a half hour and just check every minute, you’ll get an appointment.

1 Like

I’m not aiming this at you jman or amead, but, so much for equity.

Thanks for the update. I’m in Florida. I don’t think we’re at the point yet of opening up to those who aren’t over 65, so I’m being cautious and patient as I’m not eligible yet to even try to make an appointment. Regardless, my concern is that the whole appointment system seems kind of finite and slow, and I’m just hoping that the system can ramp up quickly and efficiently when more vaccine becomes available. I’ve got a little weekend trip scheduled for May and I’d love to be vaccinated before I go.

Yah - if you don’t have access to a toll-free phone number or website, you are at a disadvantage for sure. Not really sure how we will reach those without phones or internet - hopefully their healthcare providers can help.

1 Like

Obviously rooting for you to be correct, though I would bet a shit-ton of money that I am still not eligible on April 1. There’s just no way without an absolutely seismic change in vaccine availability.

I’ll take it as a pretty big win if I can get my first shot before Memorial Day.

Oh, yeah, definitely not arguing this point.

2 Likes

From what I can tell vaccination rollout has been pretty poor across North America.

Not only is vaccination availability very poor but communication from health officials has been even worse.
It seems like no one has a clue a what’s going on.
I would rate Canada’s communication regarding its vaccination plan an F.

And to make matters even worse everywhere seems to want to open up everything.
It’s like everyone has given up and all the effort and sacrifice over the last year to keep infection rates down will be for nothing.

So frustrating.

1 Like