It feels like a week ago, but I got poked in the arm on Tuesday. It happened at my neighborhood Winn-Dixie, less than 24 hours after I walked into the store—located at 805 E M.L.K. Jr Blvd. in Ybor Heights—and kindly asked the pharmacy to put me on a waste avoidance protocol list.
I did it because Colin Wolf, Digital Editor here at Creative Loafing Tampa Bay, told me he walked into the same pharmacy to get on the list. Within 24 hours of getting on said list, both of us got calls about appointment cancellations. We both rushed over to the grocery, and now both Wolf and I—clocking in with a combined age of 75—each have one dose of Moderna’s coronavirus vaccine swimming around in our bodies, with follow-up appointments set for the middle of next month.
The pokes came a few days after both Colin and I called a couple dozen Walmarts to put ourselves on their pharmacy waste protocol list (not all were participating) and after I spent three unsuccessful evenings trying to get an extra shot from the Tampa FEMA vaccination site at the former greyhound track in Sulphur Springs.
If you’re eligible for a vaccine and haven’t been poked, get to a FEMA site as soon as possible; they run smoothly, and WFLA’s Justin Schecker told me he managed to score an extra dose at a satellite FEMA vaccination site in Brandon (one of three remote FEMA sites in Tampa Bay). There's also a vaccination site at Raymond James Stadium, located at 4201 N Dale Mabry Hwy.
In Pinellas, shots are being administered to eligible people at three county health centers in St. Petersburg, Largo and Pinellas Park (you have to register to get the address). The Community Health Centers of Pinellas also has three locations administering vaccines, no appointments needed.
A staff member at the aforementioned Winn-Dixie location told WFTS’ Ryan Smith they had 12 cancellations on Tuesday—the day Colin and I got vaccinated—meaning 12 opportunities for other people to get a shot. After this post published, a CL reader commented that someone at the Ybor Heights Winn-Dixie told them its list was at over 100 people not open at the moment.
It’s important to note that not all pharmacies have waste protocol lists; others that do have them have temporarily suspended adding names. Walgreens told Smith that its pharmacists “proactively reach out to eligible customers to offer the vaccine.” Publix said it has a process for using leftover doses to vaccinate associates, and today pretty much told everyone else not on payroll to stop coming to their stores at night looking for extra doses.
But as Selene San Felice pointed out in the Axios newsletter she writes on weekdays, waste protocol lists can work (she got a vaccine over the weekend). And one Pinellas group (@pinellasforward on Instagram) has detailed how some of its members are going to CVS and getting shots.
Also important to remember is that pharmacists and anyone tasked with working their ass off to vaccinate people at the tail end of this once-in-a-century shitshow is a saint and deserves to be treated with patience and kindness.
As Smith pointed out after he spoke to us on Wednesday, Colin and I are two Floridians who’re not yet eligible to receive a coronavirus vaccine under Gov. Ron DeSantis’ current guidelines. Yesterday, without providing many details, the Trump fanboy and poseur taking a victory lap just weeks after touting Florida’s lack of a coronavirus vaccination plan, said that the “vaccine age limit will be lowered 'soon.’”
Based on the comments on this thread it doesn’t seem like *every* pharmacy is doing this but might be worth looking into for those not currently defined as vaccine eligible👇🏽
— Rep. Anna V. Eskamani 🔨 (@AnnaForFlorida) March 16, 2021
[PS: Can we please just expand eligibility right now?!] https://t.co/RXf1qRaI2S
Smith wrote that according to the Florida Department of Health, more than 4,000 doses have gone to waste. Dr. Jay Wolfson, senior associate dean of the Morsani College of Medicine at the University of South Florida, told Smith that 4,000 is a “minuscule percentage of all the doses that we have given out,” adding that any waste is a result of refrigeration requirements for the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines. Those cooling requirements are quite different from the Johnson & Johnson vaccine which we’re about to less and less of in Florida due to production issues.
I’m basically writing all this because it’s all of our jobs to get jabs when we can so that we can protect the health of our community at large. The route Colin and I took to get vaccinated isn’t scientific and didn’t come after hours spent on “vaccine hunter” message boards. Colin and I basically did a little legwork, got lucky, and took advantage of a shot that might’ve gone to waste had it not found our shoulders made tender by too many 5 p.m. Modelos.
But not everyone in Florida is set up to be as lucky. Most folks can’t get away from work for an hour to get a shot on a moment’s notice. A lot of them are too busy working frontline jobs and serving you drinks while asking you to obey mask rules. More work at the city or county to keep your lights on. Others don’t have the same access to the internet to stay to read articles like this one.
So it’s on everyone else who has a few more fucks to give to try and get theirs, help others do the same and push your elected officials to work harder to get shots in arms everywhere (props to Orlando for warning the state that it is about to open its convention center site to anyone 40 or older). We’re about to end one of the worst chapters in American history. And while we don’t know what the rest of the story looks like, it’s time for everyone to do their part to try and turn the page.
UPDATED 03/23/21 11:30 a.m. Updated to match with a version running in print on March 25, 2021.
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