Vaccine for 65 and up Dunn County residents

The Wisconsin Department of Health Services announced this morning that COVID-19 vaccine will be available for people 65 years and older starting on January 25. The 65 and over residents will be eligible under the new guidelines for Phase 1b of the vaccine rollout in the state. 

I spoke to Dunn County Health Administrator KT Gallagher today about the effect of this announcement on Dunn County residents, and how this will all work out.

As mentioned, as of the time of the interview Prevea and Marshfield Clinic have signup forms online to schedule an appointment for vaccinations. Mayo Clinic is currently asking people to wait to be contacted by their doctor in the Mayo system about making an appointment. At times during the day these websites have been overwhelmed with requests. The health department is currently working with ADRC to help out senior citizens who for whatever reason are not able to use the internet to get information and schedule appointments. 

Please note that it looks like it will take approximately 3 months to vaccinate all of the over-65 people in the state with the current supplies of vaccines, so people who want to be vaccinated will need to be patient. Some of this will also be impacted by the guidelines for who else will be covered in Phase 1b of the vaccine rollout, which should be decided later this week.