South Peninsula Hospital offers another pop-up COVID-19 vaccination clinic from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. next Thursday, May 27. The clinic is at the Boat House Pavilion near Ramp 2. Vaccines offered will be the single-dose Janssen and the two-dose Pfizer.
The Pfizer vaccine is now approved for children age 12 and older and all adults. Parental consent is required for minors.
As of Tuesday, 268,119 Alaskans are fully vaccinated, with 300,432 having received at least one dose.
As percentages, 36.8.1% of Alaskans 16 and older were fully vaccinated against COVID-19, while another 53.1% had received at least one dose, according to information from the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services.
Those between the ages of 60 and 69 are in the age group of the highest number of vaccinated people.
In the Kenai Peninsula Borough, 40.9% of Alaskans 16 and up are fully vaccinated, and 44.4% have received at least one dose. Almost 65% of peninsula seniors were fully inoculated as of Tuesday and almost 67% have received at least one dose.
SPH continues to offer walk-in vaccines daily from noon-5 p.m. at 4201 Bartlett Street, and by appointment at www.sphosp.org. Free COVID-19 testing is offered at this site daily from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. For more information, talk to your doctor or call 235-0235 for additional information.
Alaska Department of Health and Social Services data on the state’s vaccine monitoring dashboard shows that as of Tuesday, on the Kenai Peninsula 22,016 people have received at least one dose and 19,761 have been fully vaccinated, with 40,147 doses fully administered. That’s 45.7% who have received at least one dose and 41.2% who are fully vaccinated.
Statewide as of Tuesday there have been 320,891 people in Alaska who have received at least one dose and 278,540 people fully vaccinated against COVID-19 for a total of 583,921 doses administered in Alaska. That’s 54.3% of Alaskans who have received one dose and 47.7% of Alaskans who are fully vaccinated.
On the Kenai Peninsula, 70.6% of Alaskans age 65 and older have received at least one dose of a vaccine and 67.5% of seniors are fully vaccinated.
Additionally, fully vaccinated people no longer need to quarantine if they get exposed to a case of COVID-19, as long as they remain asymptomatic. To read the full CDC guidelines, visit cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/fully-vaccinated.html. The CDC also now says that fully vaccinated people can gather indoors with other people — vaccinated or not — without wearing a mask and outdoors without wearing face masks. Some restrictions still apply, such as visits to health care facilities.
Alaska was the first state to open up COVID-19 vaccines to all residents age 16 and older. The Pfizer vaccine is authorized for people age 16 and older, while the Moderna vaccine and the Janssen vaccine from Johnson & Johnson are able to be used on people 18 and older.
To see all the state’s options for health care providers offering the vaccine, or to find a specific provider, visit the state’s website at dhss.alaska.gov/dph/Epi/id/Pages/COVID-19/Vaccineappointments.aspx.
Where can you get the vaccine locally?
South Peninsula Hospital: Call for an individual appointment for Pfizer vaccination at the COVID-19 Vaccine and Test Clinic on Bartlett street. Walk-in vaccinations are available noon-5 p.m. daily. You can sign up at the hospital’s website, www.sphosp.org. Those without internet or who need assistance can call 907-435-3188.
Vaccines are not yet available through the hospital’s Homer Medical Center or South Peninsula Family Care Clinic. Anyone who has had their first dose of the vaccine does not need to call to schedule a second one. Their follow up dose was scheduled the day they got their first one.
The Safeway Pharmacy is offering vaccine appointments as doses are available. The store chain has partnered with the U.S. Department of Health and Social Services to provide vaccines to customers. To sign up for a vaccine through the Safeway Pharmacy, visit www.safeway.com/pharmacy/covid-19.html.
SVT Health & Wellness continues to offer vaccines to its patients as it receives allocations from the state. Patients can call 907-226-2228 to be put on a list to receive the vaccine. The health care provider is owned and operated by the Seldovia Village Tribe, but its clinics in Seldovia, Homer and Anchor Point serve the communities at large. The clinics welcome new patients; a medical visit is required to establish care through SVT Health & Wellness.
Kachemak Medical Group is offering the COVID-19 vaccine to people in the community, as it receives it allocations from the state. You do not have to be a current patient to receive it. To sign up for the vaccine, call Kachemak Medical Group at 907-235-7000 to be put on their list. As vaccine doses are received, the provider will call people and offer them appointments in the order they signed up. If the provider cannot reach a person on the list, they will go to the next name, but the person will remain on the list for a vaccine.
TC Community Clinic in Ninilchik is now offering the vaccine to anyone. Those interested can call 907-567-3970 to be put on the list to receive the vaccine.
Reach Michael Armstrong contributed to this story. Reach him at marmstrong@homernews.com.
