If 90,000 teachers and other school employees in San Diego County have been notified that they are eligible for COVID-19 vaccinations, why did only 23,000 sign up for their photos?
This is the question that education officials ask themselves, and the answers are not easy to identify.
The Volunteer Employee Benefits Association or VEBA is the agency responsible for ensuring that every person in the education sector who wants a coronavirus vaccine receives one. VEBA announced that education staff serving K-12 classes a few weeks ago could enroll, but the response was lukewarm at best.
“We know for sure that people go to their healthcare providers,” said Laura Josh of VEBA, who added that educators also went to local pharmacies for their vaccines. “So when you see the number of VEBA vaccines, these are the ones that went through our real portal, but we don’t have visibility or consolidated reports for those who went through the channels.”
Martha Garcia, who teaches transitional kindergarten at Las Palmas Elementary School in National City, told NBC7 that she went to a local clinic after learning she could choose what vaccine she wanted while going to a VEBA-designated site. you will need to receive any vaccine they offer.
Garcia said she and her husband want the Moderna vaccine, so they did not register on the VEBA website.
Garcia said teachers are “ready and willing” to receive the vaccine and questioned whether the numbers released by VEBA would be a true reflection of the number of teachers vaccinated.
“There is no exact way to track if a K-12 education worker has been vaccinated at another provider,” said Bob Mueller, who is tasked with managing the San Diego County Board of Education’s COVID-19 response.
Mueller said some educators may not want the vaccine, but his main concern is to make sure every education worker who wants to can get it.
San Diego County has reserved thousands of doses for educators, but if the vaccines remain unused, a county official said, they will be redistributed to those who qualify for them.