Website Showing Open Vaccine Slots In MA Created By Arlington Mom

ARLINGTON, MA — An Arlington woman on maternity leave from her job as a software engineer has done what state officials have so far struggled to do: create an easy way for people to find open COVID-19 vaccine appointments in the state.

Olivia Adams launched the site macovidvaccines.com this week. It features a list of vaccination sites around the state, and for each one a list of dates and the number of open slots. For example, the site showed 1,764 slots open on Feb. 12 at the Eastfield Mall in Springfield on Saturday morning.

Adams, who works for Athenahealth, has included vaccination sites from the state's vaccination map, as well as private sites run by pharmacies and other medical facilities. So far, she's working alone, but is seeking help and donations to keep the project going.

The state's vaccine rollout has been rocky. People over age 75 became eligible for the vaccine on Feb. 1, with more groups set to be eligible in the coming weeks.

"In January, during my maternity leave, I started working on creating [the website]," Adams wrote on a GoFundMe page. "My mother-in-law was having trouble booking an appointment for her vaccine, and then had the same trouble when she was trying to get her father vaccinated. I kept hearing the same frustrations over and over — from family, from friends, and on the news. The sign-up process was too confusing, too disjointed."

Gov. Charlie Baker said this week said he's "not satisfied with where we are" on the rollout, and has said the state will add more appointments in the coming weeks. The state has also agreed to create a vaccine hotline for seniors who may not have access to a computer or the internet.

The process has also been difficult for cities and towns staging their own clinics. For example, Framingham health officials on Friday were unable to release new appointments for a vaccine clinic set for Feb. 13. The reason: State officials on Friday changed the algorithm used to distribute doses to municipalities.

"While we appreciate the efforts to ensure COVID-19 vaccines are used as quickly as possible, this announcement makes it challenging to plan vaccine clinics," interim Framingham Health Director Alexandra DePalo said in a statement announcing the bad news. "Once again, I ask for the community's patience as we work through an evolving situation."

As of Feb. 4, just under 700,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses had been administered in the state, according to a weekly Department of Public Health report. Just 3.6 percent of those doses have been given at one of the state's three mass vaccination sites — and a fourth site is set to open in Worcester on Feb. 16. About 75 percent of doses had been given at either a hospital or a CVS store, according to the DPH report.

Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly said Adams was a Wakefield resident.