Churches Host Vaccine Clinics; Counties Awaiting More Doses

TAMPA, FL — In what's expected to be the first of many partnerships with churches around the state, the Florida Department of Health-Hillsborough County hosted a vaccination clinic at St. John's Progressive Missionary Baptist Church in Tampa.

At the urging of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, counties have been asked to recruit churches in underserved communities to host vaccination clinics.

The DOH-Hillsborough offered its first outreach clinic at St. John's Progressive Missionary Baptist Church at 2504 Chipco St. Sunday in partnership with the city of Tampa and the Florida Division of Emergency Management.

During Sunday's event, 590 people received their first dose of the Pfizer vaccine. They will return on Jan. 31 for their second dose.

"Our communities of color face a double challenge," said Dr. Douglas Holt, director of the DOH-Hillsborough. "They have a higher chance of being infected. That has a lot to do with being essential workers, being out in the community and not having the choice to work from home."

Holt said data has show that minorities are also vulnerable to more severe infections because many have underlying health conditions.

"It is essential our communities of color be the first round," he said.

"Our community has done an incredible job at staying safe during the pandemic, and protecting our most vulnerable is paramount during the early stages of our vaccine distribution," said Tampa Mayor Jane Castor. "While we're encouraged by the demand for vaccines, we must remain vigilant on the importance of our population getting vaccinated. This partnership between the state, county and the city further emphasizes how incredible our community is when we all work together."

When he was approached to host the vaccine clinic, the Rev. Bartholomew Banks Sr., senior pastor of St. John's Progressive Missionary Baptist Church, said it was an opportunity he couldn't refuse.

"Without hesitancy, I said 'yes,' knowing the importance of getting the vaccine to our community," he said. "In addition, we wanted to be one of the first in line to demonstrate the willingness to serve as an example of the need for the vaccine being distributed in our community."

Following the rollout of the vaccine to seniors age 65 and up in Florida Jan. 4 during which the overwhelming number of requests caused phone lines and online registration systems to crash, DeSantis ordered the Florida Department of Health and its 67 county offices to find more creative ways to vaccinate Florida residents.

The state began the vaccination rollout in mid-December with a pilot program in Broward and Pinellas counties that focused on front-line health care workers at five hospitals, emergency medical technicians and paramedics, and residents and staff at 100 long-term health care facilities. The effort was completed in six days.

The state has now given those facilities with 118,900 doses of the Pfizer vaccine so those who have been vaccinated can receive a second dose.

In November, weeks before the vaccines were even approved by the federal Food and Drug Administration, DeSantis announced that first priority for vaccines would be given to Florida's more than 4,000 long-term care facilities, first responders and front-line health care workers.

DeSantis' next priority was residents age 65 and older, the population most vulnerable to severe symptoms from the coronavirus. Last week, the state began the process of vaccinating the state's senior citizens.

However, the demand for the vaccine proved greater than the number of doses allotted to the state by the federal government. Many counties, including Hillsborough, Pinellas and Pasco counties, were forced to temporarily suspend registering seniors for vaccine appointments because they ran out of the vaccine.

Holt told Hillsborough County commissioners that he hopes to receive a regular supply of at least 9,000 doses of vaccine from the state each week, but added that it all depends on how quickly the two pharmaceutical companies that produce the vaccine, Pfizer and Moderna, can make it.

In the meantime, the Hillsborough County Commission fired the vendor that set up the bungled registration process and is now working with a new vendor.

Commissioners have asked the DOH-Hillsborough and county departments monitoring the coronavirus pandemic to return to the commission's Jan. 20 meeting with a more comprehensive plan to distribute the vaccine to the county's 206,000 senior citizens age 65 and older.

Despite the inability of many senior citizens to set appointments to receive vaccines, Hillsborough County managed to schedule 7,000 vaccination appointments on Monday and then pulled in county staff from other departments on Tuesday to make appointments for 2,000 more senior citizens.

In the midst of criticism over the vaccine distribution process, DeSantis noted that Florida was the first state to begin vaccinating staff and residents at nursing homes and assisted living facilities.

DeSantis said Florida was also the first state in the nation to mobilize county health departments and county emergency managers to vaccinate seniors age 65 and older.

To accommodate the thousands of senior citizens who weren't able to register for the first round of vaccine distributions last week, DeSantis announced plans to turn some state-run testing sites into vaccination sites, including Hillsborough's largest testing site, Raymond James Stadium.

DeSantis told the Florida Division of Emergency Management to immediately hire 1,000 contract nurses to be deployed throughout the state to help run vaccination sites. The contract nurses will supplement the personnel already in the field, including 800 members of the Florida National Guard who have been supporting the state's response since the pandemic began.

The first of the testing sites converted to a vaccination site was the Miami Hard Rock Stadium, vaccinating 1,000 people per day last week.

More than 60 county- and hospital-run vaccination sites have been opened in Florida as well.

During a news conference with DeSantis last week, Orlando Health announced it is opening seven community vaccination sites.

And DeSantis directed county health department to recruit churches in underserved areas to host clinics and is opening two new vaccination sites operated by Ascension Sacred Heart Hospital, one at Pensacola's Olive Baptist Church and the other at the Milton Community Center.

Find the full list here.

In the last three weeks, the vaccine was also distributed to 226 hospitals. The list of hospitals that have received vaccine allocations is available here.

DeSantis has established public-private partnerships with companies including CVS and Walgreens to operate vaccination clinics. He also announced a pilot program with Publix Supermarkets to host vaccinations at 22 stores in Marion, Hernando and Citrus counties.

For home-bound residents who are unable to travel to vaccination sites, DeSantis plans to establish mobile strike teams that will go into communities.

So far, the state has received 1.2 million doses of vaccines, including 127,000 doses of the Moderna vaccine that was distributed to county health departments and hospitals that did not receive previous allotments of the vaccine.

As of Sunday, 443,616 people have been vaccinated in Florida.

DeSantis said the state will continue to work closely with the federal government to obtain additional shipments of the vaccine. He said he expects the state to receive 250,000 doses throughout next week.

"Florida remained full speed ahead at vaccinating the state's most vulnerable residents," DeSantis said.

The Florida Department of Health will issue a daily vaccine report that will include the number of vaccinations by county, race, sex and age.

This report is in addition to the DOH dashboard updated daily with the number of people who have tested positive for the coronavirus, a list of schools where students and staff have tested positive, hospitalizations due to the coronavirus, coronavirus-positive inmates in state prisons and the number of people who have died due to the coronavirus.

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