City plans website to schedule 2nd shots
New process is meant to ease anxiety for those whose windows are approaching for final dose of COVID-19 vaccines
Houston officials plan to launch a website this week that will let people schedule appointments for their second doses of the COVID-19 vaccine.
Health Director Stephen Williams on Monday said officials plan to send out that link to people who got their first shot from the city “later this week, and maybe even as soon as tomorrow.”
The new process would be welcome news to people waiting on their second doses, many of whom have grown uneasy as their windows for the booster shot approach. Currently, city health workers call vaccinees to schedule their shots in the week before the 28day window when the second dose is recommended.
The city has cited new guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control that the second Moderna dose should be given as close to 28 days as possible after the first, but can be given as far out as 42 days. The Health Department has said it anticipates everyone who gets a shot from the city should be able to get their second one within 28 days. The city has asked residents to avoid calling the city unless they are less than 48 hours from their 28-day window.
Mayor Sylvester Turner said the city has given out more than 2,300 second shots already and has scheduled another 11,971. He said the city has received 18,600 doses for second shots. That is in addition to 41,950 doses for first shots, of which the city has administered 33,839 — about 80 percent of its supply.
The city closed its senior wait list — operated by the Harris County Area Agency on Aging — on Friday after more than 70,000 people called to enroll. Williams said it is “hard to discern” when the city will reopen that portal. It is separate from Harris County’s wait list, which launched last week, and has grown to more than 165,000 people.
“The reason for that is to not really frustrate people,” Williams said, noting that even if the city concentrated its entire weekly supply of about 9,000 shots on those 70,000 people, it would take weeks to get to everyone.
County health officials did not respond to a request for comment Monday.
The city did not open new appointments for this week, concentrating doses instead on the wait list, previously booked slots and vulnerable communities.
Turner hailed the city’s efforts at the Hope Clinic and the Vietnamese Doctors Association in Alief on Saturday, where some 500 patients were able to get their shots. The city is hoping to do something similar on the northeast side of town this weekend, according to the mayor.
Williams said the supply has not yet picked up after President Joe Biden’s administration announced last week it was close to securing more doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.
The health director said Texas expects to receive an additional 50,000 doses in the near future, an amount he said “is not a whole lot” considering the size of the state.
The president has said the increased supply — about 200 million doses — would be available through the summer.