While I agree, some of the groups included and left out in NY make no sense in terms of public health, and are clearly based on political pull. For example: lifeguards YES (next in line), postal carriers and building staff NO (all in person exclusively the entire time). Lifeguards in March. OK.
They donât check or verify here except a few occupational priorities, but those were mostly done by the employers anyway. You sign up, you claim you are 65 or a teacher and they give you a QR code to check in. We donât have to provide medical insurance or an ID.
Are there people jumping the line? Iâm sure there are but it doesnât seem to be widespread as it has been in some cities.
Got my first shot today. I had been on the county waitlist since Jan 19th. I had landed a Safeway slot March 12th but an email came from the county yesterday afternoon saying I could schedule an appointment. I got first thing this morning. They even had openings last night. The vaccination was at the hospital in one of their auxiliary buildings normally used for sports medicine and their line management would make Disney proud. They moved you around in the building from check point to registration to vaccine, through rooms, up and down escalators and in lines with circles on the floor for distancing. As soon as I got home I had an email to schedule my second dose and was able to schedule in exactly 3 weeks for first thing in the morning. An excellent experience, except for the wait since January. But they seem to be clearing the backlog now.
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@twoinanddone , the problem here in MA is that the 75-and-over group had not been dealt with completely before the governor opened up vaccinationto 65+ and anyone with 2 co-morbidities. BOOMâanother million people were granted eligibility making it tougher for the 75+ to get vaccinated.
I fear that the vaccine will be made available to the next group before my group (~1 million people) is serviced. With only one weekâs worth of appointments available, crashing servers and hours and hours online is exactly whatâs happening here.
Another thing with MA, is that the next group includes anyone who has one comorbidity. While most of the comorbidities are very specific health issues, smoking also qualifies. I have had people telling me to take up smoking for a week when that group opens, just so I can honestly say I am a smoker and make an appointment. Iâm sure there are many other people thinking the same thing. The next group is essentially going to be a free-for-all.
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I had signed up for NY notifications to help parents (who now have had Rite Aid 1st vaccine, 2nd scheduled - YAY). Today I received automated text notification/link saying Dutchess County will receive significant increase in vaccine this week. It feels like the âlog jamâ is moving more.
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@me29034 , I would say that MA is a free for all right now, since they opened up vaccination to 65+ and 2 co-morbidities two weeks ago.
We heard nothing about difficulties in getting time slots when it was just group 1 and 75+ folks.
The next group will make it an even more hopeless free for all.
Wowser, Texas Governor announces end of mask mandate and âopening up 100%â ???
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Michigan is going to open up restaurants to 50% and allow to be open until 11. Allow outdoor groups to 50 and some other openings.
But not opening up any more vaccine groups as far as I can tell.
Michigan opened up vaccines to 75+ and added 65+ almost immediately. Life expectancy for black Americans has dropped so much that their life expectancy is 67 now. So to limit vaccines to those 75+ you were excluding almost all black people.
That got to me.
But Michigan 65+, health workers, very, very few essential workers and teachers. Still.
And politicians. Donât forget the politicians.
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Itâs to celebrate Houston being the first city to detect all of the bad variants.
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Or to distract from the power failure issue
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Giving the virus one more opportunity before vaccines are widely available in a few months?
Yes, everyone is tired of a year of social distancing, etc⊠But do we really want to throw all that effort away now when vaccines will be widely available in a few months?
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H and I had our first shots yesterday in MA at a CVS. There were no long lines snaking through the store, everyone had a mask on, and there were marked spots to stand to keep you 6â away from the next person. It was fine.
Since my PCP is with Beth Israel Lahey, I also got both a text message and an email saying I could sign up. These came in the day after we got out appointments at CVS so I ignored it â but itâs nice to know the system was working.
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I think vaccines will be widely available in six weeks. Wish we could hold the line until then to avoid unnecessary death and disability.
At least we have the monoclonals, although I wonât qualify for those if I get Covid. I am grateful that I can keep being very careful until fully protected with a vaccine.
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This exactly! Unbelievable really. Itâs ok for him since he has the vaccine and the nerve to tell people that itâs a personal responsibility issue. Iâm so disgusted. If the academic program wasnât so phenomenal at UT and my daughter hasnât already been vaccinated, I might very well go down there myself and yank her out of there.
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@ucbalumnus wish I could âloveâ this post
itâs that âlaboratories of democracyâ-thingy. Eliminating masks right now is not something that I would have done, but heâs the boss (and as a famous person once said, âelections have consequencesâ.)
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Although I am still upset, it is not quite as bad as I feared. 12 other states have no mask mandate. Businesses can impose their own rules. And if covid cases account for more than 15% of the hospital beds in use, that county can reimpose masks and restrictions.
Add Mississippi to the states dropping mask mandates. I predict that we will see another state or two shortly.