How to get the COVID-19
vaccine in Brooklyn
COURIER LIFE, FEB. 26-MAR. 4, 2021 3
BY BEN VERDE
The vaccine rollout in New York has
been marked with shortages and confusion,
with those eligible fi nding the process of securing
an appointment for the life-saving
jab onerous and time-consuming.
To present the process in the simplest
of terms, Brooklyn Paper has prepared a
guide on how to get the COVID-19 vaccine
in Kings County.
Make sure you’re eligible
The rollout of the vaccine has been conducted
in the following phases, with the
state currently in Phase 1b. As of Feb. 18,
New York City had administered 1,399,055
doses of the Moderna and Pfi zer vaccines.
Phase 1a: Healthcare workers and nursing
home residents and staff.
Phase 1b: Essential workers including
school staff, grocery store workers, food
service workers, and taxi drivers, as well
as those over 65 and those with pre-existing
conditions.
Phase 1c: Expected to start between
March and April, phase 1c will include all
other essential workers and people with
pre-existing conditions, the specifi cs of
who exactly will qualify are yet to be determined
by the state.
Phase 2: Phase 2 will see all New Yorkers
qualify for the jab, with most predictions
from the federal government stating
this could happen during the late spring or
early summer.
How to get a vaccine appointment
While both the city and state are pushing
the vaccine as the key to recovery, critics
claim they haven’t exactly made the process
for securing an appointment easy. The
city and state have separate websites for
their separately run vaccination sites, and
both have proved to be clunky and confusing,
especially for the older and less technologically
inclined.
State-run sites in-and-around New York
City include the Javits Center in Manhattan,
the Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens,
and Jones Beach on Long Island. The city,
on the other hand, is administering doses
at dozens of hospitals and medical centers
around the Five Boroughs.
Additionally, New Yorkers over 65 years
of age can make appointments at some pharmacies
like Walgreens, Duane Reade, Rite
Aid, and Costco using the city’s website and
phone number.
• To book an appointment at a state-run
site, go to www.covid19vaccine.health.ny.gov
or call 1-833-NYS-4-vax
• To book an appointment at a city-run
site, go to www.vaccinefi nder.nyc.gov or call
1-877-VAX-4NYC
In response to the frustration New Yorkers
have expressed in getting an appointment
on either website, a volunteer has set up an independent
website that more clearly displays
where appointments are and are not available
at turbovax.info. There is also www.nycvaccinelist.
com.
In the meantime, the city is crafting a plan
to vaccinate homebound seniors that will
fi rst require inoculating an army of home
health aides to visit thier homes and administer
them the Johnson & Johnson vaccine,
which only requires one dose.
“We’ll reach them right there,” Mayor Bill
de Blasio said last week.
What you’ll need
The vaccine is 100 percent free, but you
must come with proof of eligibility.
If you are eligible based on your age,
you must show proof of age and New York
residency. Proof of age may include: Driver’s
license or non-driver ID. IDNYC.
If you’re eligible via your work, proof
of employment is a must. This can include
an employee ID card or badge, a letter from
an employer or affi liated organization, or
a pay stub, depending on specifi c priority
status.
If you’re one of the millions now eligible
due to comorbidities, you do not need a
doctor’s note (but with reports that patients
have been wrongly turned away, if you have
one — it won’t hurt). You will, however,
have to sign a self attestation (be it this one
from the state, or another version based on
where your appointment is made for).
ATTACK
data controversy
“The governor can smear
me all he wants in an effort to
distract us from his fatally incompetent
management. But
these facts are not going away,
because they are the facts —
unacceptable facts that hold
him accountable,” Kim said.
Zucker defends Cuomo
Administration’s order
At the center of Cuomo’s
alleged mismanagement of
COVID-19 in nursing homes,
his critics charge, was a March
25 executive order to send
COVID-19 patients into nursing
homes — which led to several
outbreaks inside the facilities,
where residents are particularly
vulnerable due to their
age.
Joining Cuomo’s Feb. 19
press conference, however, New
York State Health Commissioner
Dr. Howard Zucker defended
the order, saying it was
the right decision at the time.
“You can only review the decision
with the facts that you
had at the time. With the facts
that we had at that moment in
time, it was the correct decision
from a public health point of
view,” Zucker said.
In an effort to free up hospital
beds and fl atten the curve
“to protect the hospital system
as a whole,” the state health
guidance was designed to “send
people home if they didn’t need
to be in the hospital,” Zucker
said — which led offi cials at the
time to send COVID-positive patients
back to nursing homes.
Additionally, the commissioner
added, studies
have shown that many of the
COVID-19 outbreaks in nursing
homes were caused by asymptomatic
staff members.
“Ninty-eight percent of the
nursing homes that accepted
a hospital patient, already had
COVID in that facility,” Zucker
said. “132 nursing homes facilities
that never took a COVID
admission from a hospital still
had COVID fatalities.”
Still, even with Zucker’s defense
of the state’s actions, many
politicos have trained their outrage
at Cuomo’s alleged lack of
transparency around the number
of nursing home deaths.
One of the governor’s predecessors,
former Governor
George Pataki, called Cuomo’s
actions a “cover-up” and “one
of the worst things I have seen
in state government,” during
an interview on AM 570 WMCA
radio.
Reopening for visits
Over the next several weeks,
the debate over both Cuomo’s
handling of nursing homes,
and the subsequent reporting,
will surely heat up even further
— with multiple investigations,
legislative hearings, and a bipartisan
push to limit Cuomo’s
authority.
And yet, amid the controversy
and in between his
staunch efforts at defense,
Cuomo also announced on Feb.
19 that long term care facilities
can reopen for visitations — allowing
many families to see
their elderly loved ones for the
fi rst time in nearly a year.
“Reopening visitation —
this is going to be a very big
deal for a lot of New Yorkers,”
the governor said.
The move comes nearly two
months after the COVID-19
vaccines began rolling out
to nursing home residents
and the support staff, and as
nearly three-fourths of all residents
and staffers have been
inoculated.
“One hundred percent of
nursing home residents and
staff have been offered the
vaccine, and 73 percent of
them have been vaccinated,”
Cuomo said. “That is the largest
‘sub-group,’ if you will.”
REUTERS/Lucas Jackson
/www.ny-cvaccinelist.com
/www.vaccinefi
/www.ny-cvaccinelist.com
/www.ny-cvaccinelist.com
/www.covid19vaccine.health.ny.gov
/www.covid19vaccine.health.ny.gov
/www.vaccinefi
/nder.nyc.gov
