Suffolk Launches Phase 2 Of 'Take Your Shot' Campaign: Bellone

HAUPPAUGE, NY — Suffolk County, on Thursday, launched Phase 2 of its "Take Your Shot" campaign, Executive Steve Bellone announced on Thursday morning in Hauppauge.

The campaign was originally launched in December as a means to encourage residents to get the coronavirus vaccine. The second phase of the campaign will feature a robust multimedia campaign with television, radio and digital advertisements meant to build confidence in the COVID-19 vaccine while addressing misinformation, Bellone said. An additional $200,000 was earmarked for the program by Suffolk.

"Our goal through this next phase of the 'Take Your Shot' campaign is to eliminate or reduce concerns, hesitancy, obstacles, or barriers to getting vaccinated," Bellone said.

The Suffolk positivity rate as of Thursday was 1.7 percent; a decline from the 4 percent-plus that the county was stuck at for two months, according to Bellone. Hospitalizations due to COVID-19 were at 258 people, Bellone said, which is down from the plateau of 400.

Less than 2 percent positivity in Suffolk has not been achieved since fall 2020, Bellone said, calling the progress "huge." He attributed the "second wave" and fall's rise in cases to the holiday season that began with Halloween weekend. The decline, Bellone said, is because the coronavirus vaccines are working.

As of Wednesday, more than 660,000 Suffolk residents have received at least one dose of the vaccine, Bellone said. That's nearly 45 percent of the county's residents.

"While we've made tremendous progress over the last few months, it seems we're nearing the point where supply is beginning to outpace demand," Bellone said. "That's a stark change from where we were just a few months ago when people were poring over the internet trying to get vaccine appointments. Quite frankly, at this point, there are no excuses. The vaccine is available to everyone 16 and older. We need to be doing everything that we can to encourage people to get vaccinated and #TakeYourShot."

With the launch of Phase 2 of the county's initiative, Bellone wants to remove potential barriers to people getting the vaccine. To accommodate residents' varying work schedules, the county is offering walk-in hours at its mass vaccination sites. From 3 to 9 p.m. Thursday, no appointment will be needed to get a vaccine at the Selden campus of Suffolk County Community College.

The county also has vaccine sites at the H. Lee Dennison Building in Hauppauge, as well as the Suffolk County Community College campuses in Riverhead and Brentwood.

"We've seen promising progress as more of our economy continues to open up," Bellone said. "But if we want to return fully to normalcy, we need our residents to commit to getting vaccinated. We're getting closer and closer, but we're not there."

Bellone acknowledged that everyone is eager to not have to wear a mask any longer.

"We want to get to the point where we can say, definitively, that we have defeated this virus," he said. "That the virus is done here, and it's not going to pop back up, because enough people have been vaccinated that the virus can't readily transmit through community spread. In order for that to happen, we need to reach herd immunity. We need enough people to be vaccinated."