Mesquite officials await vaccine to carry out plans

By VERNON ROBISON

The Progress

Mesquite public health officials have lined up all of the logistics for a major rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine to local residents over the age of 70. Now they are just missing one important element: the vaccine.

Plans for a massive effort to administer around 1,600 vaccines per week in Mesquite have had to be delayed and scaled back significantly because no one is quite sure yet how many doses will actually be made available.

Distribution problems at both the federal and state level have caused delays in getting the vaccines to people on the ground. Over the past week, questions have arisen on whether adequate supply is available to sustain the ambitious rollout for which the City officials had so diligently prepared.

“We have everything set up and ready to go,” said Mesquite Fire and Rescue Department Chief Jayson Andrus who heads up the City’s emergency response task force. “We were fully prepared for what we think will be a very smooth distribution system in Mesquite. We are just waiting to see what vaccines we will have available to us.”

Plans were in place for a dedicated registration website to go live on Friday, Jan. 22. The site was set up specifically by the Eureka Resort to schedule vaccinations for the Mesquite clinics only. These appointments would have been set up for clinics to begin on the week of Feb. 2.

Andrus said that local officials felt that an independent registration site was necessary to keep the vaccine clinics available and accessible to mainly local residents.

“We have seen the county-wide systems crash and have trouble staying on top of the demand,” Andrus said. “So our hope was to avoid all of that by setting up our own site. The Eureka has been a great partner in helping get that set up and ready to go.”

But the site didn’t go live on Jan. 22 as planned. The launch was delayed because of the uncertainties surrounding how many doses of the vaccine will be available.

“With things moving as fast as they are, it made no sense to us at all to open things up, and register all these people, when we don’t even know how many vaccines we will have,” Andrus said.

As of Friday morning, Andrus said that he still believes that a clinic will take place in Mesquite during the first week of February as scheduled. But he is uncertain of how many vaccines will be given that week.

“We should know how many doses we have by Monday of that week,” Andrus explained. “Once we do, then we will open up the site for registration. Registration will be open for a day or two, or until all of the slots are full. Then we will hold the clinic later on that week.”

Andrus emphasized, however, that all of this is still just preliminary contingency planning. “We are seeing things change almost by the hour around here,” he said. “So there are no absolute certainties yet. We just hope that people are patient with us and that they know that we are doing all we can to get vaccines to the public as soon as possible. We want that to happen as much as they do.”

Andrus said that Mesa View Regional Hospital (MVRH) has worked hard in running point on the vaccination process in Mesquite. “They are the ones coordinating things locally,” Andrus said. “We are just putting out their message.”

The hospital released a statement on Thursday night explaining that more information would be forthcoming as it becomes available.

The statement listed a handful of items that were already arranged and put in place.

Firstly, the location for the clinics is secured at the Rising Star Field House at 333 N. Sandhill just behind the hotel, provided by The Eureka.

Secondly, the appointment scheduling website is ready to go live when a finalized vaccine allotment is received.

Third, the clinical staff needed to administer the vaccinations stands at the ready with a flexible schedule to fit whenever the clinics are held.

And fourth,  vaccinations will be offered at no cost when they become available.

“Our intentions are perfect, our journey to perfection is ongoing,” the MVRH statement said. “Thank you all for your patience and grace.”