Covid-19 vaccinations proceeding smoothly

A total of 280 Covid-19 vaccinations have been administered over the past two weekends, according to Point Roberts fire chief Christopher Carleton. There were 74 shots given on February 20 with another 206 the following Saturday. As of press time, Carleton said the Point had not received any additional doses for the upcoming weekend.

“If we do receive them either Friday or Saturday, we’ll have to hustle to arrange for administering the shots on either Saturday or Sunday,” he said.

Numerous residents have praised the health clinic and the fire district for their organization and professionalism in order to administer as many doses as they did last Saturday. Carleton said teamwork was the reason why everything went so smoothly. “We had over 20 volunteers helping guide, process and administer that many shots to everybody,” he said. “We had three people alone just to fill out the vaccination forms.”

The district will be looking to combine both testing for Covid-19 and administering the vaccinations on the same day in order to maximize volunteer efficiency, according to Carleton. Currently, vaccinations are taking place on Saturdays while testing is done on Sunday. The chief said come time to administer second doses, there might be a need to schedule those for a second day. “We know we’ll have second doses for March 20 for the first group who were vaccinated and we hope we’ll have second doses for last weekend’s group for the 27^th but don’t know for sure at this moment,” he said. The department will schedule each group on separate days and process them as a group.

Carleton estimates that there are still 50-65 people over 50 years of age eligible to be vaccinated who have not yet received an injection. He urged people to go to the Washington state Phase Finder page (bit.ly/3kXHUhr) to determine their eligibility to get vaccinated, adding that the criteria for receiving vaccinations was in a constant state of change.

Regardless of one’s current eligibility status, residents who are interested in getting vaccinated should email chief Carleton and provide their name, age, phone number and email address (if they have one). Individuals may also provide their eligibility status as provided by the Phase Finder site, if they wish. Carleton said that some people who had signed up using the online survey had provided invalid phone numbers or email addresses, making it difficult if not impossible to contact them.

Email chief Carleton at ccarleton@wcfd5.com.