The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Teen a pro at booking vaccine dates
NORTH BRANFORD — Nancy Kaplan was feeling desperate that her young adult son get his COVID-19 vaccination before they go to her daughter’s graduation from an Iowa veterinary school in May.
“No one wears masks there,” said Kaplan, who lives in Danbury.
Turning to the “New York/Connecticut Vaccine Hunters and Angels” group on Facebook, Kaplan’s son was given an appointment in plenty of time for the trip. Little did she know it was a 16-year-old Boy Scout who came to their rescue.
Luke Izzo, a junior at New Haven Academy, is one of the youngest members of the group, which started out finding excess doses available but now is focused mostly on getting vaccine appointments for people. When asked, they will make the appointment for you.
“Seeing Luke’s name
“People call in and they leave a voicemail … and we get back to them within 48 hours to get more detail to book their vaccine appointment.”
Luke Izzo
over and over again,” Kaplan was surprised when she “realized he’s a kid, plain English. He’s wonderful and I think did an amazing job.”
Izzo advised her son to wait a week or so to give older people a chance to get their shots, as Gov. Ned Lamont has advised, but when told they were flying out on May 2, he got Kaplan’s son an appointment right away.
“I will sing his praises again,” Kaplan said. A friend who lives in Queens, N.Y., didn’t feel competent to navigate the websites. “I reached out to Luke — this is just a few days ago — and he had her an appointment in no time. He’s making a difference in a lot of people’s lives.”
Kaplan had gone to the Angels for her own vaccine, getting an excess dose that would have been discarded if it hadn’t been used. “There were very few members” at that time. Now there are almost 24,000, with more than 20 moderators who take information and work sometimes until the middle of the night to find appointments for people.
“I’ve been booking hundreds of people,” said Izzo, who also recruited bilingual speakers in five languages to join the group. “People call in and they leave a voicemail … and we get back to them within 48 hours to get more detail to book their vaccine appointment.”
The Facebook group, linked from vaccineangel.com, is extremely busy, with people asking where they can find appointments and others offering spots they’ve found or are planning to cancel. It was launched by Joel Leyden, a journalist and crisis communicator for businesses who found an excess dose at a pharmacy in northern Connecticut “between 2,000 trees” and decided to start helping others.
That was in early February
“When people come in, they’re coming in anxious, they’re coming in desperate, they’re coming in depressed,” he said. He said the group’s efforts to help people with their bookings “shows the good side of humanity. It really shows a lot of hope and inspiration.”
When Izzo approached him to be a moderator for the group, Leyden was hesitant. “For the most part I would never take on a moderator that young. We’re looking for people with experience, professional experience,” perhaps with a health care background.
But Leyden decided to bring him on because “what he may lack in maturity he makes up for in being persistent.” He also thought Izzo could relate to people of his age group.
“Luke is a remarkable human being,” Leyden said. “He’s got a great heart. He’s got a lot to learn but he’s got a lot to teach.”
Leyden said being savvy on the internet, caring about people and persistence are the keys to the Angels’ success. “The moderators have taken it upon themselves to learn the different health care provider sites, how to work them. … Having all this knowledge, they know where to go and what to look for.” The system is set up in “the most unfriendly way,” he said.
“CVS was down for two days. Connecticut’s site, you go into it, it refers you to another site. It makes you dizzy,” Leyden said.
Alaina Brenick of South Windsor is one of the moderators whom Izzo organized as his “Vaccine Moms” because they were so active. “He kind of coordinated all of us,” she said. “I’m a college professor and I kind of got the feeling, he’s young, he must be a college student. One day he said to us, I can’t book tonight, y’all, I have to take my SAT.”
Brenick and the others on Izzo’s team of 20 have their own group chat and meet together on Zoom. “He has these innovative and creative ideas to make it better and he’s incredibly thoughtful about the process and the impact we have on the community,” she said.
Izzo said in the last month the group booked 500 appointments for people.
Brenick also praised Izzo for his concern for the more vulnerable populations, urging young, healthy people to wait so those who are older or who have health problems can get their shots first. “He actually goes door to door. He does that regularly,” she said. Izzo said he volunteers with Fair Haven Community Health Care in New Haven’s Vaccinate Fair Haven campaign.
“We’re his unofficial moms who are incredibly proud of him. I call him my boss,” Brenick said.
Izzo said the key to finding people appointments is knowing the ins and outs of each site: CVS, Yale New Haven Health, Walmart, Cornell Scott Hill Health Center, Walgreens, Stop & Shop.
“With CVS, there’s certain time frames that you have to go to,” he said. The pharmacy usually “drops” their appointments at midnight, a difficult time for working people. With Yale New Haven, “when they drop their appointments, they drop like thousands at a time. On Monday they dropped it at 6 a.m.”
Izzo said he’s booked at least 175 appointments personally. “There’s a lot of Vaccine Angels in the group but I’m one of the more prominent ones,” he said. “I consistently post daily on the page: Is there any elderly folks or high-risk folks? PM [personal message] me.” He sends out a Google form for people to give him their personal information. When the appointment is booked, they receive the confirmation email from the vendor.
He said he gets the most satisfaction from people “sending back a selfie after they got their shot.”
Between booking vaccine appointments, Izzo is senior patrol leader of Boy Scout Troop 463, chairman of the New Haven High School Democrats, takes part in Apple Pi Robotics in Guilford, Model United Nations and Model Congress.
The Rev. Vance Taylor, pastor of North Branford Congregational Church, where Izzo is a member, said, “He’s demonstrated himself as a really compassionate individual. … He’s reached out to a number of individuals in our church to help them.” He called Izzo “committed and creative. That definitely sums him up. … He’s definitely a person of faith who’s got a really good heart.”
Tracy Kennedy of West Haven also is a member of the church. She and her mother, Jane Pevick, both had COVID in December so were advised to wait three months before they got the vaccine. Kennedy also has “a really super-busy schedule” and when she tried to get an appointment, “I was getting very frustrated. Everything was booked.” So she asked Izzo to help.
“He just hopped on whatever website he went on and had us booked the next morning. … It took one thing off my plate,” Kennedy said. “He took care of it for me and my mom. It was really sweet.”
The service “alleviates a lot of pressure for people, especially the elderly who are a little bit challenged by computers,” she said.
Nicole Somerstein of Stamford is a senior at Boston University who recently joined the group and has helped her parents, grandmother, boyfriend and another friend get appointments. “I reached out to Luke … and he added me to the Facebook message group and there’s like 20 people in it and it’s nonstop,” she said. “Everyone’s always talking, booking, all throughout the night, some up to 4 a.m.” Volunteers will use multiple web browsers to keep up with the websites, she said.
“It’s been awesome. People are so grateful,” Somerstein said. People who have been “struggling for weeks to get something by themselves” will say things like, “I haven’t slept and you got something within 12 hours of when I asked,” she said. “Once you start booking people, you realize how nice it is and how fun it is.”
Nadia Major of Hamden reached out to Izzo on the Facebook group and filled out the form. “By two days I got a message from CVS: Your appointment has been booked for the first and second dose. I said ‘Wow!’” She said she couldn’t believe he was so young.
“I read his background. If he continues like this, he’s going to be something great in this community,” Major said. “I was taken aback by the fact that this complete stranger did this for me. … I sent him lunch. Really, he should get paid to do this. I’m just amazed at how mature he is. He’s great.”
“It’s awesome that Connecticut has this network of people that are willing to help others,” Major said. “That really says a lot about Connecticut.”