Amazon to open COVID-19 vaccination clinic at Seattle headquarters

(Reuters) – Amazon Inc said Thursday that it will open a pop-up clinic in its Seattle headquarters on January 24 with the goal of vaccinating 2,000 eligible members of the public against COVID-19 on day one.

Jay Carney, Amazon’s senior vice president of international affairs, who announced the plan at a press conference with Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, said a company executive would work with the Vaccine Command Washington State Center.

The clinic will be hosted in partnership with Virginia Mason Franciscan Health.

The move came a day after Reuters reported that Amazon had offered to help the United States with COVID-19 vaccine efforts, citing a letter to President Joe Biden.

The state currently allows people aged 65 and over and people aged 50 and over living in multigenerational households to be vaccinated. It has yet to grant doses for the vaccination of warehouse workers, like the one at Amazon.

The company employs more than 800,000 people nationwide and more than 19,000 U.S. Amazon workers contracted the virus as of September, underscoring the importance of the vaccine to keeping its staff and operational warehouses safe.