Interior Health says pharmacies in several communities including Kamloops, Kelowna, Lake Country, Penticton, Castlegar, Cranbrook, Vernon, and West Kelowna will be getting a small amount of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine.
“Interior Health Authority pharmacies already in the program will be receiving a top up of supply,” a statement from the BC Pharmacy Association said, noting the vaccines are meant for people over the age of 30.
“No new vaccine has been released to pharmacy locations in Vancouver Coastal, Fraser Health, Vancouver Island or Northern Health authorities. As soon as more AstraZeneca vaccine becomes available, we will update this website.”
Interior Health Chief Medical Health Officer, Dr. Albert de Villiers, says it is not clear exactly how many doses will be available at these pharmacies.
“This is led by the BC Pharmacy Association and their website has a list of all the pharmacies and you’ll have to book with them directly,” he said. “We’ve also had our AstraZeneca supply replenished, which is allowing us to resume some frontline worker immunization and we started this week with educators as well in the Central Okanagan.”
“If you’ve been on a pharmacy waitlist, please connect with your pharmacy. As soon as we get more vaccine, hopefully we’ll be able to push it out to other pharmacies in other locations as well.”
Speaking during his weekly COVID-19 briefing, de Villiers says these vaccines are likely heading to the Interior because of an increase in the rate of infections.
“We know we have a little bit of a downslide but it is higher in the Central Okanagan specifically and some of the other communities. So when we looked at it provincially as a group, we said, ‘okay, I think we should actually start getting vaccines there,'” he added.
“So its partly because of the vaccine availability but also I think maybe we can pat ourselves on the back because we’ve been really lobbying to make sure we can get more vaccine into Interior Health.”
Getting an appointment at one of these pharmacies might be another challenge. A week’s worth of AstraZeneca vaccine appointments were completely booked at the Walmart pharmacy in Kamloops, a couple of hours after a social media post by Vaccine Hunters Canada.
Speaking during her COVID-19 briefing, Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry says in cases where there hasn’t been full uptake of the vaccine, AstraZeneca doses have been transferred to pharmacies where there would be more demand.
She was also asked by NL News whether information about vaccine availability at pharmacies should be better communicated to people.
“There’s a whole lot of factors that went into how much vaccine went where. But then once it goes out into the pharmacies, we lose a little bit of line of sight,” Henry said. “Because there is a delay for when it gets entered into our immunization system. Different pharmacies have different ways of notifying people for when they have vaccine.”
People are being told to only schedule one vaccine appointment, either using the provincial system or directly at a participating pharmacy. Health Minster Adrian Dix took to twitter yesterday to say that people 50 and older will be able to book a vaccine appointment through the provincial age-based system by next Thursday, May 6.
Yesterday, Interior Health noted that more than 35 per cent of people living in the health authority were immunized against COVID-19. All adults in B.C. are able to register for a COVID-19 vaccine.
“Interior Health would like to remind everyone that COVID-19 activity is currently increasing across the region. Vaccinated or not, it is crucial that everyone follows all public health orders and guidance to reduce COVID-19 transmission throughout the community,” IHA said, in a statement.
For a list of all Interior Health COVID-19 vaccination clinics and other resources, go here.