Biden's Vaccine Push Possible In MA If Feds Up Supply, Baker Says

Some 200,000 Massachusetts residents on Friday morning preregistered for appointments to receive the coronavirus vaccine, a much smoother initial rollout of the state's new system than the old one.

Gov. Charlie Baker reported the numbers before 10 a.m. while touring St. Mary's school in Lynn, where he talked about the importance of getting students back in class.

Baker was speaking one day after President Biden directed states to make all adults eligible to receive the vaccine by May 1. The governor said Massachusetts was up to the challenge, but it needs the federal government to step up supply.

"If the feds can actually deliver on the vaccine supply issue that we’ve all been talking about ... I think getting to the president’s objective is absolutely doable,” Baker said.

Baker has been saying the state has the capacity to dramatically increase the rate of vaccination — even administering two or three times more vaccinations than it is now — but supply cannot keep up with demand.

That demand was once again demonstrated Friday morning when vaccinesignup.mass.gov went live. It was the first time people could preregister for a vaccination instead of jockey for position as tens of thousands of appointments opened once a week — a strategy that went down in flames amid website crashes and ludicrous wait times.

The preregistration site allows residents to fill out a short form with eligibility status and contact information, then sit back and wait for the state to contact them via their preferred method (phone call, text, email) when appointments at the nearest mass vaccination site open. Residents will have 24 hours to respond and sign up for an appointment.

The state will also provide weekly status updates to individuals who preregister.

It came out Friday morning that those who aren't eligible for vaccination can still preregister, though they won't be able to book an appointment until they become eligible.

Those who are eligible will begin getting callbacks with open slots by March 16.

Thursday was the final day people went to the state's vaccine finder site to hope for an available appointment at a mass vaccination site. As has been the case the past several weeks, the 40,000 slots were quickly booked.

People can still go to the vaccination finder website for appointments at other vaccination sites.

As of Thursday, more than 1.5 million people in Massachusetts received at least one vaccination shot.