Sims: Health unit has got memo on lowering barriers to shots, but GO-Vaxx hasn't - London Free Press (Blogs)

I think local public health officials would agree, at this point in the latest COVID-19 vaccination push, it needs to be as easy as possible to get a shot.

Publishing date:

Jan 28, 2022 • 12 hours ago • 3 minute read

People enter the mass vaccination clinic at Earl Nichols arena in southwest London Thursday, Jan. 20, 2022. The clinic is now accepting walk-in patients. (Mike Hensen/The London Free Press)

I think local public health officials would agree, at this point in the latest COVID-19 vaccination push, it needs to be as easy as possible to get a shot.

Similar to the first vaccination campaign last spring, there was a huge rush on adult boosters and shots for kids last month and into January.

But during the past couple of weeks during lockdown, with schools reopening and so much Omicron variant still circulating, the demand has dropped off, as has the sense of urgency. Uptake for booster shots in Middlesex-London has been encouraging among people 70 and older – almost 80 per cent – but adults younger than 40 haven’t been as quick to get a third dose.

The push to get pediatric doses into children age five to 12 plugs along. However, with schools now in session, only about 57 per cent have had a first dose.

Why is the campaign so slugglish? Lots of reasons. Socio-economic status, language barriers, work schedules, transportation issues and, I would argue, people are fed up with the pandemic.

As straight-forward as it might seem for some of us to book an appointment through the health unit website, or find a pharmacy dose, for others it’s just a hassle on top of every other stressor brought on by public health restrictions.

Already, the Middlesex-London Health Unit has been adjusting its strategy, first by turning the Earl Nichols mass vaccination centre into a walk-in clinic three weeks after it reopened. Both the Agriplex and the Caradoc community centre are expected to start taking walk-in traffic as well.

And, after a promise by Ontario’s Education Minister Stephen Lecce earlier this month that schools would be hosting community clinics for both adults and kids, the health unit announced 10 such school clinics starting Monday in neighbourhoods where vaccine uptake has been lacking.

No appointments will be necessary.

“Our objective is to really make sure that the vaccine is close to home in neighborhoods where clearly folks have not had as easy a time getting vaccinated as other neighborhoods in our community,” said Alex Summers, the acting medical officer of health earlier this week.

Even before those clinics start, on Sunday, one of Ontario’s GO-Vaxx buses will be returning to London and parking at the South London Neighbourhood Resource Centre at 1119 Jalna Blvd., across from White Oaks Mall.

That’s a smart place to set up shop. The south London neighbourhood is vibrant, economically diverse and multicultural. It’s also a postal code area with one of the lowest vaccine coverage rates in London with just 71 per cent of people having at least one dose and only 27 per cent of kids with one shot.

But here’s the issue. You can’t get just hop on the bus and get jabbed. You must make an appointment on the provincial website ( covid19.ontariohealth.ca/ ), or by calling 1-833-943-3900, which is a separate booking site from the health unit’s trusty appointment site that’s been used by thousands of local people.

In an emailed statement, the provincial government said “in response to increased demand for vaccine,” appointments are necessary to “provide an orderly and safe process for staff and people attending a GO-Vaxx mobile clinic.”

I’m not sure what the GO-Vaxx folks are expecting. Demand for shots is sinking. Another layer of red tape won’t coax a single mom juggling multiple jobs, or a new Canadian for whom English is not their first language, or a senior with mobility issues into finally getting vaccinated just because you have a shiny bus.

Not when there already are shots galore at the big clinics, the mobile clinics, the pop-up clinics, the pharmacies and with primary care. And public health practically is begging people to come to get them.

I hope people do turn up Sunday, but I have to wonder if the vaccination bus needs to re-tool its requirements. It might look across the street at the White Oaks Mall, where the health unit operated one of its most successful mobile clinics, without appointments, last fall.

Make it easy. For everybody.

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