KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The Johnson County Department of Health and Environment will make adjustments to its COVID-19 vaccination site after residents waited long lines and were not socially distant on Tuesday.
Carol Caviar, a Johnson County resident, said she was relieved to get the first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine on Tuesday, but the wait in the cold was not pleasant.
“It’s freezing here, someone said it was like the Disneyland line and I was like, but much colder,” Caviar said.
JCDHE director Dr. Sanmi Areola apologized “for the inconvenience and inconvenience” experienced at Okun Fieldhouse in Shawnee.
“Our goal, our intention was to vaccinate as many residents as possible today and the rest of the week,” Areola said during a press conference Tuesday afternoon.
Areola said that from tomorrow there will be better parking and traffic control, along with additional staffing. There will be at least 20 vaccinators on Wednesday, along with more staff to help “flow” inside the building and while they wait outside, he said.
“This is a marathon,” Areola said. “We’re trying to do it in phases, so you don’t have to wait too long.”
Mary Beverly, Johnson County Deputy Director of Health and Environment, said the department is working hard to make sure long lines are not a problem for future clinics. He said part of the problem could have been patients showing up an hour earlier for their appointments.
“We really don’t want people to do it because that can cause a bottleneck, if people can come ten, fifteen minutes before their appointment, I think it’s very helpful,” Beverly said.
The JCDHE announced last week that it would move to phase 2 this week and predicted that it would take a while to get past the stage.
Dan Danz said Tuesday’s line moved quickly once inside.
“Once you meandered across the line, it wasn’t a big deal,” Danz said.
Danz said he is finally happy to have received his first shot.
“I’ve been in quarantine with my wife since the first part of March, so I’ll be happy to be able to go out and move around a bit,” Danz said.
On Monday, JCDHE said all of its 7,584 vaccination slots it had for the week were already booked.