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Kaiser Permanente, Providence, Legacy Health and Oregon Health & Science University are pooling their COVID-19 vaccine doses and staff to launch what they call a mega clinic at the Oregon Convention Center in northeast Portland.
“The most efficient way to deliver this vaccine is not in many small sites, but in larger mass vaccination sites,” said Wendy Watson, COO of Kaiser Permanente Northwest.
Watson said the need to vaccinate everyone in the state as quickly as possible makes mass vaccination sites a necessity. Hospital campuses do not have enough parking, indoor space or staff to accommodate the number of people vaccinated in addition to their regular flow of patients.
The plan and the partnership are a work in progress, and many details have yet to be finalized, including how people eligible to receive the vaccine can sign up for appointments.
Kaiser’s goal is to launch the Oregon Convention Center vaccination clinic next week, initially on a smaller scale.
“We will increase the number of appointments to be vaccinated depending on the supply of vaccines we receive,” Watson said.
This week, the federal government announced it would release all available doses of the vaccine instead of withholding some for second doses. Governor Kate Brown has said she expects these additional doses to start arriving in Oregon on January 23.
Starting on that day, Brown opens up immunization eligibility to two new groups: people 65 years of age and older, and K-12 educators and child care providers, although it will be weeks or more before the state has enough vaccines to offer doses to all qualifying.
The launch of a mass vaccination site in Multnomah County, to serve the Portland metropolitan area, will be a key part of a larger statewide effort to accelerate vaccine distribution in anticipation more doses – and more demand.
Blanca Rokstad, CNA at Rose Villa in Portland shows off her vaccination record after receiving the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine on December 21, 2020. After a slow rollout of the state’s vaccination efforts, Oregon health systems are planning to speed up the pace of vaccinations with vaccination sites, including a clinic at the Oregon Convention Center in northeast Portland.
Kristyna Wentz-Graff / OPB
Kaiser will also partner with Salem Health to support the Oregon Fairgrounds Vaccination Clinic, and work with Clark County, Wash., Health Systems to plan a mass vaccination clinic site there. -low.
Watson said the crux of building more effective mass immunization clinics is that health systems receive a larger and more consistent supply of vaccine from the federal government and vaccine manufacturers.
“At the moment we are hearing more doses coming in, but we haven’t really seen a change in our allocation,” she says.
Kaiser is organizing a trial clinic at one of his doctor’s offices this weekend, with the aim of vaccinating around 3,000 people. The OHSU hosted a drive-thru clinic at the convention center last weekend and vaccinated more than 2,000 home care workers and first responders.
In the first few weeks of vaccine availability, Oregon lagged behind other states and its own health experts’ expectations for the speed of deployment. Brown demanded that public health officials administer the state up to 12,000 doses per day, a target the state said it met on Thursday.
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