COLUMBIA – Few meetings are available when South Carolina residents over the age of 70 can begin enrolling in the COVID-19 vaccine on Wednesday, so they should not expect to receive a blow soon, state officials said in the field of parliamentarians’ health.
A webpage (scdhec.gov/vaxlocator) shows seniors where statewide photos are available. A green dot from a healthcare provider indicates that it has doses to give. Red means that it has already gone out or booked appointments for the expected stock.
“There won’t be many appointments,” Marshall Taylor, interim director of the SC Department of Health and Environmental Control, said during a state meeting in the Senate on Tuesday. “If it’s red, don’t waste your time ringing. Green will turn red pretty quickly.”
Taylor didn’t know for a long time until the doses would become more easily accessible to the elderly in South Carolina.
The state Senate hearing came a day after Governor Henry McMaster and DHEC announced an extension of eligibility for anyone over the age of 70.
Within one hour of the announcement, the webpage collapsed. The site and the phone line provided in the press release were not prepared for the immediate flood of clicks and calls, Taylor said.
“We thought when we said, ‘Look at Wednesday,’ people will start clicking on Wednesday,” Taylor told senators, wondering why people can’t pass.
DHEC needed the two-day delay to prepare with health care providers, most of whom did not know about the eligibility change until the announcement, he said.
“What you’re saying is that they’ll call and try to make an appointment, and the appointment won’t be made?” he asked Senator Tom Davis, a retired Beaufort County Republican.
Accessing the DHEC site is the first in a two-step process. It will be displayed in real time where photos are still available, but appointments must be made with suppliers. If a point on the map is green, it will provide contact information.
“I’m afraid we’re preparing everyone for a big disappointment,” Sen. Sandy Senn, R-Charleston, said of the seniors.
As of Tuesday, 65 percent of the 147,200 doses of Pfizer vaccine shipped to South Carolina since mid-December had been administered, compared with 23 percent of Moderna doses reserved exclusively for long-term care facilities.
Nearly 106,000 additional photos are already reserved for health care workers, officers and paramedics who made appointments before the Jan. 15 deadline set by McMaster last week for eligible employees in the initial phase, according to DHEC.
“We have seen a dramatic increase in hospital appointments with health workers” because of the deadline, “said Dr. Brannon Traxler, DHEC’s director of public health, during the meeting.
DHEC encourages any senior with the ability to access the website to do so instead of calling a hotline or waiting a long wait on the phone. And periodically check if the red squares turn into green dots.
South Carolina receives about 64,000 doses a week from the federal government. Whether a vaccine provider will schedule appointments for doses that have not yet been received will vary by location, Taylor said.
Until this week, South Carolinians who do not live or work in long-term care facilities could receive a blow only at state hospitals. Some large private doctors’ offices may start sharing photos this week for eligible residents.
The addition of people over the age of 70 to the eligibility list came after lawmakers were inundated with complaints from worried seniors who wanted to shoot. About 70 percent of all South Carolinaers who died of COVID-19 in March were 70 years of age or older.
Other states, including neighboring North Carolina and Florida, had already made seniors eligible.
An appointment will be needed, Taylor said, adding that South Carolina wants to avoid long lines outside hospitals and pharmacies in states like Florida, where people waited for hours without being able to get a vaccine before consumption ended.
Taylor called the two-step process of finding where photos are available, then called the location for a meeting, a “short-term solution.”
“I realize it’s archaic,” he said.
But it will have to do so as DHEC works on an easier online registration system, which Taylor hopes to run by next week, he said, adding that it will likely take longer.
Follow Sean Adcox on Twitter at @seannaadcox_pc.