MANATEE COUNTY – Everyone over age 65 in Manatee County now has a new way to sign up to receive a COVID-19 vaccine with the launch of the county’s new lottery-style system.
The new system was announced during an emergency county commission meeting and was launched on Jan. 7. Rather than seniors scrambling to receive an appointment on a first-come, first-served basis as vaccine doses become available, now they enter their names into a standby pool where recipients are randomly chosen for an appointment as more doses are received by the county.
To get in line to receive a vaccine appointment, seniors can sign up one of two ways – by visiting the county’s website at any time or by calling 311 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.
To register, seniors must provide their name, contact information, zip code and birth month and year to verify their age. There are no residency requirements to receive a vaccine in Manatee County, however the two vaccines currently being administered, those made by Moderna and Pfizer, require two separate vaccinations administered a few weeks apart. The Moderna vaccine requires 28 days between doses while the Pfizer vaccine requires 21 days between doses. Anyone receiving the first vaccine in Manatee County must also receive the second one in the county.
Manatee County Public Safety Director Jake Saur said that the first evening the new vaccine standby pool sign up was available to the public, over 18,000 people entered their names in the pool with more than 30,000 signed up by the end of the next day.
During a Jan. 6 meeting with Manatee County commissioners, Saur said that the previous method of scheduling vaccines, using a first-come, first-served signup process through Eventbrite, was causing frustration for people trying to sign up for appointments and crashing both the Eventbrite and Manatee County websites due to increased traffic. By instituting the standby pool, he said that it will take the pressure off to sign up. Because recipients are chosen at random, there’s no need to rush to try to be first in line. As vaccines become available, 311 operators call those seniors randomly selected to schedule an appointment. Seniors should look for a call from 941-742-4300. If the person can’t make their appointment or doesn’t answer their phone, their name goes back into the selection pool and operators move on to the next person, so if you’ve signed up for a vaccine appointment, it’s important to remember to answer your phone.
To receive a vaccine, patients will have to provide a form of photo identification at the vaccination distribution site to prove their age. They also must provide their vaccination confirmation number, which will be given by 311 operators when making an appointment, and a copy of their completed vaccine consent form which can be downloaded here. If you don’t have access to a printer, a copy of the form will be provided to you at the vaccination site for completion before a vaccine can be administered.
Gov. Ron DeSantis visited the county vaccination site at Bennett Park, 280 Kay Road in Bradenton, for a press conference on Jan. 7 to praise the efforts being made by Manatee County leaders to administer as many vaccines as possible to first responders, frontline medical professionals and seniors age 65 and older. DeSantis announced that since Manatee County’s vaccination efforts were going so well, he would release an additional 500 vaccine doses to the county. Saur said those doses were fully booked using the new lottery process by noon the following day.
An update on the county’s COVID-19 vaccination efforts is expected during the Jan. 12 county commission meeting.
