Biden, Harris praise Ariz.
On a virtual tour of State Farm Stadium’s COVID-19 vaccination site, the nation’s leaders said Arizona’s model could be replicated in football stadiums across the country. “You’re doing such a great job,” President Joe Biden said to state health officials.
While on a virtual tour of Arizona’s only 24/7 COVID-19 vaccination site, President Joe Biden on Monday called the operation a model that could be used in other football stadiums around the country.
Biden said he received a call from a top football official during Sunday’s Super Bowl offering the use of 30 major stadiums across the country as vaccine sites.
“So I think they’re going to be coming to you to look at how you did it because you’re doing such a great job,” Biden told Dr. Cara Christ, the Arizona Department of Health Services director who led Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris on the first part of the virtual tour.
Biden said he’s hoping to get two doses of vaccine to more than 300 million Americans before the end of summer.
Biden, Harris and Christ did not discuss registration problems that have been happening with the state’s appointment system because of over
whelming demand, though Christ did emphasize the site could be doing more vaccinations if there was more vaccine supply. And Biden spoke about efforts to improve supply.
“We’ve now been able to go out and talk with — personally, with the vaccine manufacturers. They’ve upped significantly the commitments to the amount of vaccine they’ll produce and when it’ll be produced,” Biden said. “... And things are beginning to click. People are beginning to feel that they can find their way to get the vaccine.”
Harris wanted to know about Arizona’s “hardest-hit communities and those who may have a difficult time with transportation or just, proportionally, are some of the hardest hit but maybe not receiving the vaccine at the greatest number.”
Christ responded that the State Farm site is “just one portion of our state vaccination plan,” and that the state is looking to put community-based vaccine sites in hard-to-reach and disproportionately impacted zip codes. State health officials are working with Arizona’s Medicaid program, which is for people enrolled in the government health insurance program for low income people, she said.
“We have contracted with communications groups that specialize in reaching our Hispanic/Latino or our hard-toreach populations to do intense communication about the importance of vaccine,” she said.
The partnerships at State Farm Stadium are an example of the unity that’s needed to get Americans vaccinated, Biden said.
There’s no such thing as a red or a blue state when it comes to COVID-19, he said.
“We’re going to face some setbacks along the way, including the complication of the strains that we’re seeing from South Africa and other places,” Biden told Arizona officials. “But I know we can do it. We’ve never failed as a country when we’ve done things together. Never, ever, ever, ever fail when united. And you guys are the example of unity. So thank you, thank you, thank you.”
Arizona’s vaccination goals
The State Farm drive-thru site is completing about 350 to 400 vaccinations per hour, which includes both first and second doses, Christ said. That works out to between 8,000 and 9,000 vaccinations per day, which the state would like to ramp up to 10,000 to 12,000 per day.
“The main goal of this site was really to accelerate getting vaccine into the arms of Arizonans,” Christ said. “This has accelerated our efforts here in Arizona . ... We weren’t sure that we would have the demand that we needed. However, our sites and appointments book up very quickly and our flow through the night is just the same as it is during the day.”
Christ emphasized during the tour that Arizona has a large influx of winter visitors and migrant agricultural workers needing vaccinations.
The Arizona Department of Health Services is resubmitting a request to the federal government for an immediate 300,000 additional doses of vaccine, plus 300,000 more per week moving forward, Christ said. Also, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey has been reaching out to let federal officials know that the state’s population swells in the winter.
Members of Arizona’s congressional delegation have written letters to federal officials, emphasizing the need for a larger vaccine supply .
State Farm Stadium opened Jan. 11 as a mass vaccination site and is one of two state-operated mass vaccination sites in Maricopa County. The other site is at Phoenix Municipal Stadium near the Phoenix Zoo, which opened on Feb.1. Both sites are open seven days per week, but State Farm Stadium is the only site operating 24/7.
The state’s partners include the Ben and Catherine Ivy Foundation, the Arizona Cardinals, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Arizona, Arizona State University, Walgreens, the City of Glendale, the Arizona Department of Emergency and Military Affairs and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Christ said the public-private partnership model is happening at Phoenix Municipal Stadium, too, where the state is partnering with Arizona State University, Arizona Complete Care the Arizona Diamondback and Walmart.
“We’ve had so many Arizona companies and groups reaching out and asking how they can help with future sites,” Christ told The Arizona Republic after the virtual tour.
On Jan. 21, the federal government deployed 25 FEMA staff, including logistics staff, traffic managers and runners, and administrative to support to help the State Farm site operate 24/7, White House COVID-19 Coordinator Jeff Zients said.
Federal funding is also paying for the National Guard to be on site, he said.
“Our support to the state goes beyond State Farm Stadium,” Zients said. “We’ve deployed almost 300 federal personnel from FEMA and three other federal partners to support vaccination operations across the state. That includes over 100 vaccinators from HHS (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services) that we sent just this weekend.”
Just this week, FEMA awarded $20 million to Arizona to support the COVID-19 response, including vaccination operations, Zients said.
“These funds can help support building new community vaccination centers just like this one,” he said.