The Comox Valley’s COVID-19 mass immunization clinic is set to open tomorrow morning (April 1) at Glacier Gardens Arena in Comox.
Jenny Nijhoff, public health nursing co-ordinator along with her staff of technicians, IT specialists, facilities co-ordinators and nurses, midwives and other medical professionals are finalizing last-minute details at the arena in preparation for the clinic opening, which should remain on-site at least through to the end of September.
“We may even grow from there – we even have professional nurses coming tomorrow .. and that’s why we moved from the hospital bay (the former immunization site in the Comox Valley) because we’ve nearly doubled or tripled our capacity,” she explained.
During the clinic’s shorter days, staff is able to vaccinate a maximum of 360 people a day; on longer days, the capacity increases to 480 people.
Nijhoff said getting the clinic online has taken a lot of time and hours, but she and her team are drawing upon their past experience.
“Once we got the a-okay that we got this site, it’s been a couple of weeks with lots of help to get it going … our staff is very used to other immunizations – it’s what we do, such as flu clinics, but this is on a very different scale that we’re pulling this off.”
The clinic will be open seven days a week, Monday to Thursday from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m., Friday to Sunday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
For age cohorts eligible for the vaccine, visit islandhealth.ca/learn-about-heallth/covid-19. To book an appointment, call Island Health at 1-833-348-4787, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily.
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