Here’s how to sign up for, use regional COVID vaccination site at Kentucky Horse Park
The Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington will serve as one of the state’s regional vaccine sites beginning Tuesday, and officials explained how the operation will work.
The Kentucky Horse Park site will be administered by Kroger at the Alltech Arena. Appointments opened Thursday and can be scheduled at Kroger.com/COVIDVaccines after 5 p.m. or by calling 1-866-211-5320. The appointments are for Kentuckians in phase 1B, particularly those 70 and over.
Three more regional sites — at Ephraim McDowell Regional Medical Center in Danville, Baptist Health Paducah and Mercy Health-Lourdes Hospital, also in Paducah — will come online next week, and Gov. Andy Beshear said additional regional, high-volume vaccine sites will be announced in coming weeks.
Kentucky Transportation Secretary Jim Gray, who has been tasked with overseeing the state’s vaccination efforts, said the plan is to administer up to 3,000 doses at the regional sites per week. People must have an appointment to receive the vaccine.
The vaccines will be administered inside the Alltech Arena, Gray said.
The Kentucky Horse Park site will operate from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday the week of Feb. 1, then from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thursday through Saturday beginning the week of Feb. 8.
State vaccine information can be found at http://vaccine.ky.gov or by calling 855-598-2246, starting at 5 p.m on Thursday.
Beshear said the new website and phone numbers can help people determine when and where to get the vaccine.
“We have no doubt that any available appointment will fill up immediately and we need every Kentuckian to know our ability to add more appointments and vaccine locations is strictly dependent on supply,” Gray said. “We do already have more Kroger regional sites planned in the weeks to come, and we look forward to sharing that exciting news soon.”
What will happen once you arrive for your vaccination?
Gray detailed what to expect at the Horse Park.
Signs at the Horse Park will direct those with appointments to the Alltech Arena parking lot, where recipients need to wait in their vehicles until five minutes before their appointment time. Security staff and National Guard will be on site with golf carts to drive those with difficulties walking from the parking lot to the building entrance.
In bad weather, there will be options to wait inside while maintaining social distance.
Once in the vaccination area, recipients will go through four stations, with the first requiring identification that patients need to bring. At the second station, only those with insurance will be asked for their insurance information because Kroger is allowed to bill insurance for an office visit.
At the third station, recipients will be vaccinated before the last stop at an observation area where they will wait 15 minutes to ensure any rare bad reaction is addressed.
The latest on other Lexington vaccination programs
In addition to the Horse Park site, vaccinations will continue to be administered at the University of Kentucky Kroger Field for those in eligible categories, including those over the age of 70, city officials said earlier Thursday.
The Fayette County Health Department, in connection with the city’s senior center vaccinated this week some seniors who have internet, mobility or transportation issues, Kevin Hall, a spokesman for the department, said during a Thursday council meeting on COVID-19.
The health department will continue to focus its vaccine allotment on those with barriers in the over-70 category.
The health department receives a limited number of vaccines each week, Hall said. It typically does not know how many doses it will receive until Monday. That’s why it’s hard for the health department to schedule appointments weeks in advance.
Seniors with transportation, internet or mobility issues can receive notifications about future clinics by providing information here: www.lfchd.org/covid19-vaccine. This does not register users for future clinics. It is a way to be notified about future vaccination clinics as they become available. People with questions can call 859-899-2222 or email covid19vaccine@lfchd.org.
Baptist Health in Lexington, which had initially received vaccination allotments, will now only be receiving second doses of the vaccine, city officials said Thursday.
Since mid-December, 48,628 doses of the vaccine have been administered in Lexington, said Chuck Mix, who has been hired as a logistics coordinator to help with the vaccine distribution in the city. That number does not include any doses administered this week, he said.
“We are dependent on the allocations that we receive,” Mix said. Earlier this week, President Joe Biden pledged to increase the amount of vaccines sent to states.
But upping vaccination production will take time, Mix and others said Thursday.
Until fall, Fayette County likely won’t have enough people vaccinated for herd immunity or enough people vaccinated to stop the spread of the virus, officials said Thursday.
“All we need is more vaccine,” Mix said.
Campaign to reach residents reluctant to get vaccinated
Simultaneously, the city is planning a comprehensive messaging and communication effort to reach populations hesitant to get the vaccine.
Kip Cornett is overseeing that education and outreach effort as part of Mayor Linda Gorton’s task force on vaccine distribution.
“We know only 50 percent of Fayette County’s population gets the flu shot,” Cornett said. That means there is likely going to be a lot of resistance to the coronavirus vaccination.
To reach those populations, Cornett and others are working on a multipronged education and outreach effort using traditional media, social media and possible video conference presentations with medical experts, so people who have questions about the vaccine can get those concerns addressed.
Cornett said the messaging would also be in multiple languages to reach Lexington’s growing foreign-born population.
Some of the information used in that campaign will be available the week of Feb. 8, Cornett said.
This story was originally published January 28, 2021 at 1:08 PM.
