Have you gotten a COVID vaccine?

[Lumpy1106]

Florida is the most efficient in providing vaccines to those who need it most....healthcare, first responders, over 65, etc. Something like 65%. Other states may want to take notes.

And opening schools, and allowing kids to play sports, and keeping businesses open and opening amusement parks, etc. FL got a lot of flack early on for the aggressive stance, but safe to say "Florida Man" got it right this time. KUDOS to them!

 

[Lumpy1106]

So you think all states should be opening their vaccinations up to non-permanent residents that live in other countries the vast majority of whom are over 65 & will be vaccinated before the general population? I doubt many people in other states would be okay with that.

Um...checking in from CA. I can't get my 75 DM a vaccine appointment as you might recall from earlier in the thread. Just want to say I'm OK with that. CA is holding back a lot of vaccine so they can follow their "Equity" protocol. That's not right. The 65+ crowd is who is ending up in the overloaded hospitals. Keep them healthy and the hospitals will finally get a break. Or you could hold back the vaccine until absolutely everyone working in health care gets it while the patients keep flooding in. Just look a the headlines - pretty easy to see what is really working.

 

[Ariel484]

Vaccines start here in Ohio for those 80 years and older today (if they manage to get an appointment...). I hope things get moving quickly for everyone! My husband is a teacher and is supposed to be eligible for one the week of February 1, but he hasn't heard anything about appointments yet.

 

[gillep]

has anyone been vaccinated on this thread who has had covid in the past?

Both my mom and her husband had COVID and received the vaccine.

My mom's husband got his first Pfizer dose about 7 days post COVID symptom recovery. He is an ER nurse and his doctor advised it was OK to receive so soon post recovery of symptoms. He got pretty sick with both his first and second dose (headache, chills, fever) but was fine within 72 hours of each.

My mom got her first Moderna dose about 20 days post COVID symptom recovery. She got pretty sick with her first dose (congestion, cough, chills) but was also fine after 72 hours, she has not received her second dose yet.

The symptoms each experienced after their vaccines mimicked the symptoms they each had with COVID but were milder and shorter in duration.

 

[Mango7100]

Thanks for the updates! I really just can't make it all make sense. Do our states have that many more front line and health care workers? Or are other states just shortchanging those sectors and moving on to the over 65's? Did other states get more vaccine per capita?

Meanwhile one of my daughter's roommates is fully vaccinated at 19 because she works 15 hours a week at the hospital. Other 2 roomies have appointments because they do the same. I told her at least she will have her own little bit of herd immunity working soon. But honestly, she's not the one we're most worried about. My 80 and 87 year old parents still wait for even a chance to schedule an appointment. My 87 year old dad has given up almost a full year of seeing family. He doesn't have that many family events left.

I see no way those sites shown online could ever handle the Pfizer vaccine properly. Maybe Moderna? Maybe they're waiting for the J&J vaccine?

At least in my county in TN they have finished the major hospitals but they still haven’t finished other healthcare workers and then they opened it to 75+. So they haven’t finished the highest priority group before opening up to the next group. I know one guy who works in a COViD testing lab and can’t get a vaccine appointment because he doesn’t work for a major hospital group...it’s crazy. The assisted living my 78 year old MIL lives in here hasn’t even started vaccines but 75+ year olds living independently have gotten vaccines through the few general public appointments.

I randomly found a post from a hospital that they were doing a drive thru clinic next week and was able to secure an appointment for my 75 and 81 year old parents. My parents aren’t on social media and there is no way they would have known about it otherwise. Seniors who aren’t tech savvy or don’t have a family member watching for them are definitely at a disadvantage.

 

[ENJDisneyFan]

Seniors who aren’t tech savvy or don’t have a family member watching for them are definitely at a disadvantage.

Totally agree. My county in Michigan is only doing appts through the hospital websites. My mom had to create an account for my 88 year old grandpa and now we are stalking the website for an opening. There is a 0% chance my grandpa could have done any of that on his own. There has to be a better way!

 

[disneyworldsk]

Both my mom and her husband had COVID and received the vaccine.

My mom's husband got his first Pfizer dose about 7 days post COVID symptom recovery. He is an ER nurse and his doctor advised it was OK to receive so soon post recovery of symptoms. He got pretty sick with both his first and second dose (headache, chills, fever) but was fine within 72 hours of each.

My mom got her first Moderna dose about 20 days post COVID symptom recovery. She got pretty sick with her first dose (congestion, cough, chills) but was also fine after 72 hours, she has not received her second dose yet.

The symptoms each experienced after their vaccines mimicked the symptoms they each had with COVID but were milder and shorter in duration.

Thank you for this reply. my dh will be 90 days out and has an appt. at the 90th day mark approx. and i was concerned.

 

[Mango7100]

Totally agree. My county in Michigan is only doing appts through the hospital websites. My mom had to create an account for my 88 year old grandpa and now we are stalking the website for an opening. There is a 0% chance my grandpa could have done any of that on his own. There has to be a better way!

Right?? If your target audience right now is 75+, don’t rely on Twitter and FaceBook to post about openings. Don’t have a system where you have to creat accounts, have passwords, and stalk websites. Common sense...

 

[mrs. magoo]

Right?? If your target audience right now is 75+, don’t rely on Twitter and FaceBook to post about openings. Don’t have a system where you have to creat accounts, have passwords, and stalk websites. Common sense...

I totally agree. If I didn't make the appointment for my father and drive him he would still be waiting by the phone for the doctor's office to call. In my county the hospital systems have a lottery system for appointments for those 75 and above. Some of my coworkers told their parents to make appointments or volunteered to make appointments online but their parents said they will wait to have it done at the doctors office. No amount of telling them that was not going to happen would work so now they are upset that they do not have appointments and are beginning to panic. Again I am not sure of the best system but the current one is not going well but it is like the Wild West out there.

 

[Lumpy1106]

Totally agree. My county in Michigan is only doing appts through the hospital websites. My mom had to create an account for my 88 year old grandpa and now we are stalking the website for an opening. There is a 0% chance my grandpa could have done any of that on his own. There has to be a better way!

Right?? If your target audience right now is 75+, don’t rely on Twitter and FaceBook to post about openings. Don’t have a system where you have to creat accounts, have passwords, and stalk websites. Common sense...

+1 on these comments from CA. Not only that, but all this effort and I have been completely unable to get the appointment. Meanwhile our 35 yo Mayor and my 30 yo DC (speech therapist but working remotely) HAVE gotten the vaccine. So much for equity.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

I have a question because it seems like nothing for the elderly is appeasing anyone. I totally agree that website sign ups present a barrier for non-tech savy or even non-tech owners. And hearing from stories some of these signs ups are too complicated and unnecessarily so. But then I also hear that calling in there's too much demand, they can't wait on hold for hours, you have to keep trying calling in at random times, for days, they hope that they get a call back and also something I thought of means to do it as in dialing is harder for the particular person like eye sight or hearing the person on the phone.

And the response is always "there's got to be a better/another way". For the millions of elderly who aren't in LTC what is the better way?

 

[Meriweather]

AZ just added over 65 today.
DH and I got appointments for the end of Feb.....hard to get that. They are still working on the previous priorities.
We had to plan around our WDW trip too.....didn't want the second dose around then.
We have to go almost an hour, but I am so glad I got the appointments today.
My OCD was going into overdrive and hated the thought of trying every hour for months

 

[georgina]

AZ just added over 65 today.
DH and I got appointments for the end of Feb.....hard to get that. They are still working on the previous priorities.
We had to plan around our WDW trip too.....didn't want the second dose around then.
We have to go almost an hour, but I am so glad I got the appointments today.
My OCD was going into overdrive and hated the thought of trying every hour for months

Apparently the state of PA has also added 65+ as of today. However Allegheny County has not updated their info to include that group in vaccination appointments.

 

[ORD2KOA]

I'm over 65 and got my first dose of Pfizer/BioNTech on Friday here in Orange County, FL. No pain at injection site, no reaction.

Inoculations are given at the Orange County Convention Center. The process was easy and they were very organized.

I probably should have added the process. I logged in a day after they opened the portal and got our appointments. They booked both at the same time. One on January 15th and the next one is February 12th. Appointment is confirmed online, by e-mail and by text. E-mail and text include a QR code for each appointment.

We have a very organized system here in Orange County. Get an appointment, drive over to the convention center during your 3-hour appointment window (you never leave your car), queue up outside and follow into the parking garage. Present your QR code and ID, answer the "no we're not sick" questions, get a print out of information about the vaccine, they print a label with a bar code to stick on your arm and wait to get into the next available queue and then the slot. The bar code is checked by nurses who ask the same "are you sick" questions and they go to each side of the car and vaccinate. On the way out, bar code is scanned and you go to the parking lot to wait 15 minutes to see if you have a bad reaction, then you're scanned again before leaving the facility. For us it was just over two hours door-to-door including about 70 minutes total travel time, and the 15 minutes waiting, so it only took about 35 minutes from when we got there until we left the garage to go back to the lot and park for 15 minutes to make sure we were okay.

 

[ENJDisneyFan]

I have a question because it seems like nothing for the elderly is appeasing anyone. I totally agree that website sign ups present a barrier for non-tech savy or even non-tech owners. And hearing from stories some of these signs ups are too complicated and unnecessarily so. But then I also hear that calling in there's too much demand, they can't wait on hold for hours, you have to keep trying calling in at random times, for days, they hope that they get a call back and also something I thought of means to do it as in dialing is harder for the particular person like eye sight or hearing the person on the phone.

And the response is always "there's got to be a better/another way". For the millions of elderly who aren't in LTC what is the better way?

You have a valid point. I'll give you my thoughts...
-Implement a consistent (at least state wide) approach to signing up for an appointment versus having each county doing their own thing. As I said I've been trying to get an appt for my grandpa so I've looked at all the surrounding counties and they are literally all different. Some are taking surveys to collect info and then call you to book an appt. Some are using a sign up genius. Some are doing random lotteries. It's literally all over the place.
-Don't rely on each person having some sort of "account" with the vaccine provider. Allow people to sign up and then show proof of eligibility upon arrival.
-Rather than social media, rely more heavily on 'traditional' news sources like TV, snail mail, and phone calls to reach the elderly with information.

Just some ideas. I realize it's a huge undertaking and there is no perfect solution.

 

[ORD2KOA]

Just some ideas. I realize it's a huge undertaking and there is no perfect solution.

I also think Medicare should have had a hand in organizing this. They pretty much know where every over 65 person is down to zipcode and could have helped coordinate.

ETA - I forgot to mention that I also think medical insurers should have been called on to help orchestrate this.

 

[snappy]

Except the initial guidelines were for 75 and over

 

[crjack]

I also think Medicare should have had a hand in organizing this. They pretty much know where every over 65 person is down to zipcode and could have helped coordinate.

ETA - I forgot to mention that I also think medical insurers should have been called on to help orchestrate this.

Agreed. Also engage every towns Elder Services/Councils on aging and Meals on Wheels. They know the seniors who live outside of a facility. Case managers and volunteers could assist with explaining the process and scheduling appointments.

 

[Meriweather]

Apparently the state of PA has also added 65+ as of today. However Allegheny County has not updated their info to include that group in vaccination appointments.

I wouldn't have know but my Perio sent an email saying they added 65+ and it started at 9 am today.
I haven't been to that doctor in about 4 years! But so glad I got the email.
The county still has not updated. The email had the site to go to.
It was on the radio too.
And then DH couldn't get the date to work for him. I saw lots of availability (it's in a stadium).
I did it for him but it took 3 tries to get the availability to show again. Then we got the exact same time.

 

[bethbuchall]

I know it’s been repeated. But, seems worth repeating here.
You could still get infected with the virus even with the vaccine.

And this vaccine will not have an effect on 5% of the population.

The last part is misleading. There was only 1 case of severe COVID among all of the vaccinated participants in both the Pfizer and Moderna studies. So while it did not prevent COVID in all subjects, it’s inaccurate to say that it had no effect on 5%.