SWFL prepares for vaccination on a larger scale

As we approach the day everyone will be able to get the COVID-19 vaccine, cities are planning now to be ready. The Florida Department of Health-Charlotte County says there are a few key things that go into making a vaccination site successful: location, personnel and good communication with the public.

Joseph Pepe, director of the FDOH-Charlotte, believes the county would be able to handle mass vaccinations. He says the department always wants to be one step ahead. so when they get heavier vaccine supplies, they are ready to distribute. To get ready, the department has pinpointed several new vaccination sites.

“We have those conversations constantly right now: How can we make this better, faster, more efficient,” Pepe said. “We have identified locations all throughout the county that are different locations in the community. They have different benefits as far as dealing with weather and things like that. But also for volume; we have probably about six or eight locations right now. Should we have enough vaccine supply to open up additional sites, we can do that fairly quickly.”

WINK News also reached out to both Collier and Lee counties. Lee responded, saying the vaccination site near RSW is scalable to 10,000 people a day if need be, and that they have a large number of volunteers on standby.

“We have posted several positions right now, and we’ve asked for additional support,” Pepe said. “So I think in combination with all that, we’re going to be adding a lot of stuff in order to support vaccines. We know that this program is going to be going on for several months, so it needs to be sustainable.”