Citi Field 'Mega' Coronavirus Vaccine Site Sees Limited Supply

FLUSHING, QUEENS — Mayor Bill de Blasio swallowed his Red Sox pride and donned New York Mets garb when he announced that a 24/7 "mega" COVID-19 vaccination site would open at the Citi Field baseball stadium in January. Even Mets owner Steve Cohen had a cameo in the mayor's virtual briefing to share the news.

The site's opening on Wednesday morning — two weeks later than planned, which city health officials blamed on a vaccine supply shortage — appears poised to not live up to that "mega" hype.

The site will be open around-the-clock four days a week, instead of the 24/7 schedule touted last month. And it will only have the supplies to administer about 800 vaccines a week, or 200 daily, a City Hall spokesperson acknowledged.

In the Jan. 12 announcement about the vaccination site, officials said it would scale up to be able to vaccinate as many as 7,000 people per day.

Meanwhile, a vaccination site that opened Friday at Yankee Stadium in The Bronx has the capacity for 15,000 vaccine doses in its first week thanks to a partnership with the state.

"NYS is supplying the majority of the doses at Yankee stadium," City Hall spokesperson Avery Cohen wrote in an email to Patch. "We have no supply. That’s why we’re only able to offer 800 doses."

A Cuomo spokesperson placed the blame on the federal government, which controls vaccine distribution.

The limited supply sets up a vaccination hurdle for the Queens residents, TLC-licensed drivers and food delivery workers who are allowed to get inoculated at Citi Field — a decision meant to promote vaccine equity by reserving doses for populations disproportionately affected by the pandemic.

De Blasio said the goal is to make Citi Field into a 24/7 site and acknowledged the vaccine-supply disparity between the two baseball stadiums, which he attributed to the state's role in setting up the Yankee Stadium site.

"I want to see more vaccine shifted of course to the Citi Field site, and that will happen in the days ahead," de Blasio said. "Look, that site to me has to become a 24/7 site. It’s not going to be that yet. It's only going to be certain days, but the goal over the next few weeks is to get to 24/7."