Parkland Hospital began to provide COVID Vaccine booster shots last week. This information is for eligible people who received their second dose of the Pfizer vaccine at least six months ago. Qualified people include anyone above the age of sixty-five and those with an underlying health condition. Employees in high-risk work environments like health care workers and teachers are also eligible for the booster.
On the first day, the booster became available, approximately four hundred cars drove through the Parkland vaccination site at the Ellis Davis Fieldhouse parking lot in southern Dallas County. Among the people who sought to get their shots was Maria Wagnon, who says that getting the booster shot is personal.
“I have a sister in the hospital,” Wagnon said, speaking of her sister, who has been on a ventilator for four weeks due to COVID. Explaining why the shots are important to her, she revealed that she has had cancer in the past and is at risk if she contracts the virus. “I’ve had cancer in the past, so I don’t want to expose myself to things,” she said.
There has been confusion over the set of people who are eligible for the booster. “[The policy] leaves a lot for interpretation,” the Director of operations for COVID testing at the Ellis Davis site said. “But our first responders, our grocery workers, they are coming through,” she continued, “so we are seeing individuals in those categories. But if they are answering yes to those questions, of course, we are vaccinating them.”
Last week during a meeting among the panel for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the use of the booster for people in high-risk occupations was not approved. On Friday morning, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky broke with the panel and approved the recommendation of the booster for people in high-risk occupations.
“I recognize that confusion right now. Our recommendation is for these limited people in the population: over 65, high-risk workers, high-risk community occupations, as well as high risk by comorbidities,” she said.
Parkland’s pop-up clinic at the Ellis Davis Field House is held on Monday through Saturday from 7:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. CVS and Walgreen pharmacies also offer booster doses.