Rockland Opens Emergency Ops Center To Help Seniors With Vaccine

ROCKLAND COUNTY, NY — Rockland County has opened its emergency operations center for a reason local officials consider just as important as a hurricane: the coronavirus pandemic.

"This is an all-hands-on-deck moment," County Executive Ed Day said in a news briefing Wednesday in front of the EOC. "We must do all in our power to assist the people that we serve."

When the coronavirus vaccine rollout opened to senior citizens the second week in January, (SEE: Feds Expand Vaccine Eligibility But Not Distribution of Doses), Rockland officials were inundated with calls and comments.

Most were from people not only frustrated by the state's complicated sign-up system, but also frantic that the lack of vaccine meant they were spending hours trying to nail down one of very few appointments.

In mid-January, the county's Office for the Aging started trying to help residents age 65 and older schedule appointments to be vaccinated. After spending 2020 helping clients by delivering food and PPE, the department started up a call center and immediately found it a full-time operation.

"It is our primary focus day in and day out," OFA Director Tina Cardoza-Izquierdo said at the briefing.

As of Tuesday 11,448 people are on a waitlist.

There are more than 65,000 people in Rockland County over the age of 60.

Volunteers from 19 county departments have been assigned to the work of fielding calls and finding appointments for those on the waiting list. Every weekday, the Emergency Operations Center will be staffed with 25 people from across the government, plus three people from the Office for the Aging.

The Office for the Aging has also been helping local pharmacies, who bear the principal responsibility for vaccinating the elderly, handle appointments and clinic days. That will continue.

Rockland residents age 65+ can sign up to the Senior COVID-19 Vaccine Waitlist by calling the Rockland County Office for the Aging at 845-364-2110, Monday through Friday (except holidays), 8 a.m. through 5 p.m. Spanish and Creole speakers are available. In addition, residents can sign up online http://rcklnd.us/c19-waitlist.

The state rules call for pharmacies and doctors' groups to vaccinate the general public (now limited to people 65 and older), while hospitals vaccinate frontline medical workers and the developmentally disabled, and local health departments vaccinate essential workers and people in congregate living facilities.

However, when state health officials made people with comorbidities eligible for the vaccine, Rockland officials saw an opening. Going forward, they will be allocating some appointments at the health department's clinics to senior citizens with comorbidities. Day said other initiatives to work with community partners are in the works.

"We are slowly but surely getting those most at risk protected," Day said. "We ask that you please have patience and keep trying and we will get you vaccinated."

The problem remains high demand and low supply, though the companies are continuously ramping up manufacturing and the federal and state governments are becoming more efficient about distributing the doses.

In Rockland, 12.8 percent of the population have been vaccinated in 11 weeks, just over the state average of 12.3 percent. Out of the 592,196 tests for coronavirus in the county since the pandemic started, the county has had a 6.4 percent positivity rate, according to New York's COVID-19 Tracker.