How do I get an appointment for a COVID vaccine in New Jersey?



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Hundreds of thousands of New Jersey people have been trying to secure an appointment for a coronavirus vaccine since Wednesday, after Governor Phil Murphy opened up access to the vaccine to more than 4 million more people on base expanded federal guidelines.

Last week’s announcement led to a slew of calls and attempts online to get a date. Many couldn’t find one and many more said they had to hunt and spend a lot of time before they could reserve a spot.

If you are eligible, you can register directly with vaccine providers.

These can be found on a list provided by the State Department of Health, said Donna Leusner, spokesperson for the Department of Health.

These locations include county and municipal sites, individual hospitals, pharmacies, and ShopRite sites.

“The national vaccination site list is a list of facilities that have received the vaccine,” Leusner said. “The vaccine supply is limited, so people may not be able to get an appointment immediately.”

The list includes the phone numbers and websites of those who have online listings.

You need to have an appointment, said Health Commissioner Judy Persichilli. The facilities will not accept walk-in tours, she said.

“People should register at any registration site where they want to be vaccinated,” Leusner said. “We will reach everyone.”

You can also go through the state’s pre-registration system, called New Jersey Vaccine Scheduling System (NJVSS), but it doesn’t automatically schedule appointments, officials said.

When you pre-register, you’ll eventually receive a notification letting you know when you’re eligible to make an appointment, Gov. Phil Murphy said last week. The state will then provide a link where you can select a vaccine location, and then you can schedule an appointment. State officials did not say how long it could take to get an appointment through the state system on Friday.

More than 1.5 million people had pre-registered at the state site as of Friday, Murphy said. As of Friday, 66,000 people had received a notification that they were eligible to register for an appointment, and of those, 10,371 had made an appointment at the state site, officials said. .

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But not all vaccine administrators are linked to the state site, Health Commissioner Judy Persichilli said on Friday. Some vaccination sites are connected to the state system while others, like hospitals, have their own registration systems, she said.

“It’s a little more awkward than we would like,” she said.

The state said that eventually more than 250 sites would offer vaccines, but the state has not released information on how many of those sites are linked to the state’s registration system. And many people said they booked by speaking directly to a vaccine administrator, including hospitals, counties, clinics and retailers.

But at least one provider listed on the state site, Inspira Health, only accepts appointments through the state site, spokesman Paul Simon said.

Inspira Mullica Hill Medical Center and Inspira Vineland Medical Center do not accept phone appointments at its two vaccination sites, he said. The two sites received 1,600 vaccine requests as of Thursday alone, he said.

“Any member of the general public who is currently eligible to receive the vaccine will need to register and then register (choose a date and time) through the state’s website, covidvaccine.nj.gov,” Simon said.

You can also turn to four of the state’s six mega-sites.

The open venues are the Moorestown Mall in Burlington County, Rowan College of South Jersey in Gloucester County, the New Jersey Convention and Exposition Center in Middlesex County, and Rockaway Townsquare in Morris County. Two additional sites will open later in East Rutherford and Atlantic City.

Each of the mega-sites requires people to register through the site’s online registration systems. Walk-ins are not accepted.

Many sites across the state don’t have enough vaccines to meet demand, so some have suspended their reservation systems and will only make more dates available when they receive more doses.

State officials have said that from now on, the state expects to receive 100,000 additional doses per week, and they hope those numbers will increase in the weeks and months to come. Persichilli said last week that the state could handle 470,000 weekly vaccinations if the federal government could provide the doses.

Currently, those eligible for a vaccine include people aged 65 and older and people aged 16 to 64 with certain underlying medical conditions that the CDC considers put people at “risk.” increased severe disease ”if they are infected with the virus: cancer, chronic kidney disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), Down syndrome, heart disease, such as heart failure, coronary artery disease or cardiomyopathy, people who are immunocompromised after a transplant. solid organ, obesity, severe obesity, pregnancy, sickle cell disease, smoking and type 2 diabetes.

COVID-19 “severe illness” is defined by the CDC as requiring hospitalization, ICU admission, intubation or mechanical ventilation.

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NJ Advance Media reporter Avalon Zoppo contributed to this report.

Karin Price Mueller can be contacted at [email protected].

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