After successful vaccination push, strategy is shifting, experts say
A vial of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. U.S. Dept. of Defense photo
Free COVID-19 vaccines will be available for the foreseeable future in Winooski and the larger State of Vermont.
On Dec. 14, 2020, a shipment of 1,950 Pfizer vaccines arrived in Vermont for at-risk health care workers and residents at long term residence facilities. Since then, Vermont has moved forward with its vaccine availability schedule to become one of the highest vaccinated states in the US.
Vermont is a few weeks past large vaccine drive-ins, and Winooski has transitioned into using walk-in clinics and pharmacies as the main form of delivering vaccines to people, according to state health experts. This accessibility will remain for the near future.
“In the beginning there were these really really large clinics, where we were trying to vaccinate Vermonters as expeditiously as we could,” said Heather Danis, the state health director for Chittenden County.
Some of the clinics that the National Guard ran were set up at the Doubletree hotel in Burlington, and they could vaccinate over 1,000 people a day, running their clinic from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., Danis said.
“Now that we’re further in and we’ve been so successful in vaccinating Vermonters, we don't really need to run thousand person clinics. There's not really a demand for that, so the vaccination strategy has shifted,” Danis said.
Vaccination strategy now shifts to local pharmacies and local distribution sites for getting Winooski residents vaccinated. Examples of this shifting strategy include the table at the Winooski Juneteenth event vaccinating attendees for free, and the free vaccination clinic at the Winooski school district on Saturdays.
The strategy also includes keeping the vaccine accessibility high in non-english speaking communities in Winooski and Vermont at large.
The Vermont Department of Health has been partnering with the Association of Africans Living in Vermont and the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants Vermont, two organizations that provide services to New Americans in both Burlington and Winooski, said Danis.
“We held those clinics because we know that people who are English language learners have a particularly challenging time navigating the state's website for registration to get an appointment because the site is entirely in English,” Danis said.
The Department of Health partnering with these organizations is not the only form of outreach to these communities — the health department’s website also hosts a number to get in contact with interpreters and often work with cultural liaisons.
“As we have throughout the vaccination program, we are always adjusting our strategies depending on need,” said Katie Warchut, Public Health Communication Officer for the Vermont Department of Health said in an email, who also said that there aren’t plans in the near future to roll back the current vaccination methods in the community.
Warchut also stated that there isn't a current vaccination rate in mind that would trigger any rollbacks in the vaccine program.
The Department of Health also said that they were going to follow the CDC’s recommendations for any future booster shots developed for the Covid vaccines.
Pfizer and other vaccine developers have said that they are researching the need for booster shots to keep the body’s resistance to the virus high and to combat future variants.
The health department’s website will show that appointments are still available for people who need vaccinations, as well as options for appointments in local pharmacies. The vaccine is free for anyone who still needs to be vaccinated.
