Lexington’s COVID-19 Kroger vaccine site is ‘turning point.’ New appointments coming.
Kentucky’s first regional vaccination center opened Tuesday morning at the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington, providing a much-needed increase in doses administered to patients.
“We are vaccinating people faster than the federal government can get us doses,” Gov. Andy Beshear said at the Horse Park Tuesday. “... Our only limitation at this point is supply.”
There were 3,000 appointments scheduled for the site’s first week, according to Transportation Secretary Jim Gray, who’s also directing the state’s regional vaccination effort. Registration for the site opened Thursday, and every appointment was filled in about 90 minutes, Gray said, indicating that demand greatly exceeds available shots.
Beshear said the state can continue to “scale up” in vaccine distribution, and the Kentucky Horse Park vaccine site will feature drive-through vaccinations once the weather is warmer and supplies are available. The site was only set up for indoor vaccinations in the Alltech Arena Tuesday.
About 362,000 Kentucky residents have been vaccinated since the state got its first doses in mid-December, Beshear said. About 86 percent of first doses had been used as of Tuesday, Gray said. Much of the initial vaccine shipments went to hospitals and to health organizations like University of Kentucky Healthcare, which also has a larger vaccine center.
UK’s vaccine center expanded its Saturday hours and increased its vaccination capacity by about 1,000 doses per week, according to an announcement from UK HealthCare. The center is now open from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturdays, according to UK HealthCare.
UK said it has vaccinated close to 34,000 people including health care workers, first responders, teachers and people over 70.
Additional state regional vaccine sites will also be announced Thursday and on Feb. 11, Beshear said. Appointment scheduling for those newly announced sites will open at 5 p.m. the day of the announcements.
The sites are not equal in size or scale. For instance, a regional vaccine site in Danville was offering one-tenth of the doses of Lexington’s operation.
“We want to vaccinate everybody right now,” Beshear said. “The quantities don’t allow that yet.”
When to look for new appointments online
New appointments will be opened up a week before the day the shots will be available. For instance, the Lexington center is closed Monday through Wednesday next week. The first day of operation next week is Thursday, Feb. 11, so appointments will be available this Thursday, Feb. 4, according to Kroger’s Erin Grant.
Appointments for Friday, Feb. 12, will be available online on Friday, Feb. 5. Appointments for Saturday, Feb. 13, will be available online on Saturday, Feb. 6. The available appointment slots are posted at 6 a.m., according to the governor’s office.
Use the website kroger.com/covidvaccine to schedule an appointment with Horse Park as the location.
Vaccine sites limited until more doses available
The state has been told that vaccine supply will increase once vaccine candidates from AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson become available, Beshear said.
Beshear said the Lexington operation and other sites opening soon will be the primary way the doses are administered to the public until vaccine stocks increase. The state can’t turn to health care providers like doctors’ offices for distribution until the vaccine supply becomes more steady and reliable.
A lot of health care providers want to give out the vaccines, but “if we were to supply them all, everybody would get 36 doses,” Beshear said.
The federal government on Tuesday announced it would ship vaccines to 6,000-plus pharmacies on Feb. 11, to be used in accordance with state guidelines. The quantity was limited to a total of 1 million doses, but those 1 million are in addition to another 10.5 million going to states, tribes and territories as companies continue to increase vaccine production.
Technology and customer service are the biggest challenges in setting up the vaccine centers, Beshear said.
Gray urged those eligible to watch for more appointment slots to open.
“Please keep trying” to sign up, he said.
Kentucky’s 70-plus residents remain the focus
Vaccination appointments at the regional centers are limited to Phases 1A and 1B, which include health care workers, first responders, anyone over 70 years old, and K-12 school personnel. But those 70 or older are being prioritized, Beshear said. That age group has accounted for the majority of COVID-19 deaths in Lexington and Kentucky, according to the state Department for Public Health.
Those in Phase 1C, which includes anyone age 60 or older, anyone age 16 or older with high-risk underlying conditions and all essential workers, will have to wait for their turns. But opportunities may open up for those in 1C to get the vaccine early.
“We have two goals,” Beshear said. “To try to go by our priority groups, but also to get 90 percent of every dose we get into someone’s arm in seven days. That means we are going to have sites that dip into 1C to make sure we meet that goal because that gets us to herd immunity as quickly as possible.”
Danville vaccine site was given 300 doses. It got 170,000 calls
The Ephraim McDowell regional vaccine site in Danville also was approved as a regional vaccination site Thursday despite previously being denied. Beshear said that after finding out the health care provider was getting 300 doses, 170,000 callers flooded the provider’s phone lines attempting to get an appointment.
Ephraim McDowell officials said Tuesday they serve six counties and about 120,000 people. Officials said they had a waiting list for those trying to get an appointment. Individuals can join that waiting list by calling (859) 936-8350 Monday through Friday between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. or by going to www.emhealth.org and completing an online form, according to a news release.
This story was originally published February 2, 2021 at 9:40 AM.