Like many DC seniors, I had a frustrating experience while trying to schedule my first Covid-19 vaccination on Monday, the first day the District opened registration to those of us 65 and older.
I first tried at noon, through the vaccinate.dc.gov portal.
My expectations were low. Snags had been reported in signing up healthcare workers around the country, with websites crashing and phone registration no better.
Well, the DC website did not crash on me, but it was clunky. These are some of the issues I encountered:
- It took me a while to figure out that if appointment did not pop up right away at a particular vaccination center, there were no appointments available.
- A calendar button appeared to show scheduling options beyond this week. I clicked, to no avail.
- Then in trying backtrack, I got stuck on a page with the locations map. I actually had to reregister to get back to the vaccination sites and appointments.
- When I reregistered, I saw a message: “If no appointments are available, please register again tomorrow.” I got the impression that users had to reregister every time they checked for appointments.
- When I finally found a site that had appointments and signed up, I got the message, “This site does not have vaccines allocated.” I was totally mystified by this.
I tried to call for an appointment, too. That led me to a dead end. And when I tried again online at 3:30 p.m., this message was on the scheduling page: “All 6,700 of the available vaccination appointments for the week of 1/11/21 were filled.”
This message appeared on vaccinate.dc.gov in the afternoon of Monday, January 11th.
That was an eye-opener. Communications to the public did not make clear how many appointments would be available during the first week of the expanded rollout. Remember, there are approximately 85,000 people over the age of 65 in the District. The 6,700 appointments allotted for the week amount to less than 8 percent of the senior population. And that’s not DC’s fault. The District and communities around the U.S. are limited by the number of doses they receive, and the national distribution has been inconsistent.
Ward 3 Council member Mary Cheh, in an email to constituents on Tuesday, said the District has typically received around 4,000 vaccine doses per week, and the amount was expected to triple this week.
“But, even with this increase, it is clear that there was simply no possible way that there would be enough doses or appointments available for every senior anxious to receive one,” Cheh wrote.
Cheh’s office has been in contact with the team at DC Health to identify and correct the many issues her constituents have told her about. “Happily,” she wrote, the DC Health team told her that “they will launch user-friendly updates to the online portal and will clearly state which sites have available appointments and which sites are full moving forward.”
Cheh also said she is addressing a number of outstanding issues with DC Health, “including confirmation that the automatic alert system is functioning, whether additional call volume can be added to the appointment phone line, and what plan is in place for inoculating home-bound seniors.”
Residents on Cleveland Park and Chevy Chase listservs brought up another issue that wasn’t mentioned in Cheh’s newsletter. It appears that some who thought they succeeded in scheduling appointments did not succeed in getting their shot. A few people said they had arrived at the Chevy Chase Safeway for scheduled appointments or to seek information on registering, only to be told that the city had scheduled 300 vaccination appointments, but the pharmacy was given only 15 doses. (Given the number of vaccination centers in the District, it’s likely those numbers were for the week, not the day they arrived.)
Not even the start time for seniors’ registration was certain. According to some sources I had seen, the system was to open at noon on Monday. DCist reports some people were scheduling appointments as early as 8:30 a.m.
On Monday, January 18th, the process starts again. If you have suggestions on improving the scheduling system beyond what Cheh included in her newsletter, please comment below.
And in the meantime, Cheh said, “it is important to remember that we still have access to simple, yet strong tools to protect ourselves: always wearing a mask when outside of the home, maintaining social distance, regular hand washing, and staying at home to the greatest extent possible.”
“Vaccine rollout will continue, and so too should our prevention efforts.”
Pat Kasdan says
The new pharmacy, Pills Plus, on Connecticut near Van Ness, has a sign outside saying “Covid Vaccine”. I went in to inquire, but saw that the two women behind the counter were not wearing masks, so I left. Aren’t salespeople in DC required to wear masks?
Green Eyeshades says
Yes. See Mayor’s Order No. 2020-80, “Mayor’s Order 2020-080: Wearing of Masks in the District of Columbia To Prevent the Spread of COVID-19” (issued July 22, 2020).
Section II –Roman Numeral Two — of the Order states as follows (exceptions in Section IV do not apply to employees):
“II. INDOOR WEARING OF MASKS
“Except as specified in Section IV of this Order:
“1. Persons must wear a mask in the common areas of apartments, condominiums and cooperatives.
“2. Businesses, office buildings, and other establishments open to members of the public shall post signage on their exterior doors stating that a person may not enter unless the person is wearing a mask. In addition, the business, office building, or other establishment shall exclude or attempt to eject persons who are not wearing masks or who remove their required masks.
“3. Employers shall provide masks to their employees.”
Full text of Order 2020-80 is here:
https://coronavirus.dc.gov/maskorder
Nothing at that link says that Order 2020-80 was superseded or repealed.
Stan Marcuss says
The DC vaccine appointment system is simply not working.. On two separate occasions, I accessed the D.C. appointments website at precisely the time it was scheduled to open. In the few minutes it took for me to input the required information about my name and address etc,,the vaccination website reported that appointments were no longer available. it is inconceivable that the 1,7oo or so appointments available each of those days could have been allocated during the few minutes it took for me to supply with lightening speed the required registration information.. Corruption of some kind is the most likely explanation.
Green Eyeshades says
If you give us the link you used, we could try to crowd-source how the registration screens operate (or fail to operate). I have not bothered to attempt to get an appointment yet because so many DC residents have had the same experience you did.
Green Eyeshades says
Since you mentioned “corruption” would be the most likely explanation for DC’s non-working vaccination registration system, I thought you would appreciate this excellent example in the LA Times of corruption in delivering vaccinations. A wealthy private hospital in LA County whose CFO is a parent of a student in a wealthy, upper-crusty private school in LA County, gave vaccinations to teachers in the private school weeks before they were eligible, regardless of whether they were age 65-and-older.
The details are worth taking a few minutes to read, including the devious excuses made by both the hospital and the administrators of the private school.
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-02-13/hospital-violated-la-county-rules-by-vaccinating-teachers
MarketWatch updated a story today about similar corruption by private hospitals in three other states, but the details are sketchier than what the LA Times discovered going on in LA County. Time will tell whether we discover similar corruption by the private hospitals here in the District.
Green Eyeshades says
The DC Health method for making appointments is deliberately abusive and insulting for senior residents 65-and-over. The “Vaccination Appointment Guide” that DC Health posted last week is NOT EVEN SPECIFICALLY AIMED AT SENIOR RESIDENTS. It includes at least two screens with drop-down menus that are only for healthcare workers, not for senior residents! Before a senior resident can even gain access to the appointment rabbit hole, she must first pass a “CAPTCHA” quiz to prevent robots from using the system. What an insult.
Skim through these ridiculous 28 pages to see if you agree with me:
https://coronavirus.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/coronavirus/page_content/attachments/Vaccination-Appointment-Guide-1-28-2021-GENRAL.pdf
Roger Myers says
The most “amateurish” part of the DC vaccination Registration process is — the need to repeat the entering of the registration information each time you do not succeed at securing an Appointment. Or in my case when I had an appointment at Safeway at a set time… only to be told, that they were promised that they would get vaccines for 100 people, but only received 16. ??? I was directed to a phone line with 156 people ahead of me. Then back to the web site, where I first had to CANCEL my original appointment and reenter all me information again. Repeat 10 times….. A very basic computer programmer capability to do a SAVE or a CUT & PASTE would have solved the problem, but the DC city programmers were not able to figure that out. And were actually paying these folks.
GMail automatically saves your DRAFT and saves it. You can come back to it and complete it at any time.
Green Eyeshades says
Were any of Connection’s readers as surprised as I was to learn that a “majority of Ward 3 residents” who are seniors have already received their first vaccination shot?
On Tuesday, February 9, City Paper reported this:
“A majority of Ward 3 residents who are 65 or older have received the first dose of the coronavirus vaccine, compared to 16 percent of Ward 8 seniors. [EOM]”
The “EOM” refers to the Executive Office of the Mayor, which posted this link:
https://coronavirus.dc.gov/data/vaccination
Today, Friday, February 12, the middle of the Mayor’s link shows two sets of Ward maps. The lower set of maps shows data for first shots by Ward, as of February 6 (six days ago). According to the left map (pink/purple), 8,723 DC residents aged 65+ in Ward 3 received at least their first vaccination shot as of February 6. According to the right map (grayscale), those 8,723 residents in Ward 3 represent 58.5% of residents aged 65+ in Ward 3.
If 8,723 residents 65-and-over are 58.5% of all such seniors in Ward 3, then our Ward has a total of only 14,911 residents aged 65-and-older. Recent statistical data on Ward 3 from the Census and American Community Survey does seem consistent with Ward 3 having roughly that many senior residents.
To be honest, my first reaction was not to admire the success of the vaccination program in our Ward but to wonder, “what about me?” How did so many seniors in Ward 3 get their first shot already when I have been unable to get an appointment through DC Health and have not heard one word from my hospital provider about getting an appointment?
Green Eyeshades says
The Mayor’s office and/or DC Health posted new data about the percentage of Ward 3 residents 65-and-older who have received their first vaccine shots. The data is presented in the same kind of maps as described in my Feb. 12 comment, above, but as of February 14 rather than February 6 in the first posting.
Astoundingly, the data as of Feb. 14 shows that the absolute number and the percentage of Ward 3 seniors who got their first shots went DOWN ! Now the maps claim that only 50.4% of Ward 3 seniors age 65-and-older got their first shots, for a total of only 7,511 residents! Those figures are eight percent lower than claimed as of Feb. 6, and 1, 212 residents lower.
Somehow the vaccination process for Ward 3 residents age 65-and-older is going BACKWARDS.
https://coronavirus.dc.gov/data/vaccination
Green Eyeshades says
After this clownshow on Thursday morning, Feb. 25, the rest of the District will recognize that DC Health does not really care how much psychological harm it causes to residents needing vaccinations:
https://dcist.com/story/21/02/25/dc-vaccine-appointment-system-crashes-qualifying-medical-conditions/
This time, senior residents are probably in the minority of residents who are being abused by the online system for making appointments. The mistreatment of residents seeking vaccination appointments is identical to the mistreatment of unemployed residents whose unemployment benefit payments were repeatedly delayed, sometimes for months. The District government does not really care about us.
Green Eyeshades says
Montgomery County starting doing vaccination appointments the right way this week. Take a look at part of a County email message that a friend forwarded to me. In this portion of the email, the County listed three specific locations for Thursday, Feb. 25, and the same three locations for Friday, Feb. 26, and gave a specific separate Internet link for each of the six possible combinations of appointment day/location. The links are omitted in the quote below:
“To register for Thursday 2/25/2021 (9:00 am to 4:00 pm @ Richard Montgomery High School):
[link omitted]
“To register for Thursday 2/25/2021 (9:00 am to 4:00 pm @ Quince Orchard High School):
[link omitted]
“To register for Thursday 2/25/2021 (9:00 am to 4:00 pm @ White Oak Recreation Center):
[link omitted]
“To register for Friday 2/26/2021 (9:00 am to 4:00 pm @ Richard Montgomery High School):
[link omitted]
“To register for Friday 2/26/2021 (9:00 am to 4:00 pm @ Quince Orchard High School):
[link omitted]
“To register for Friday 2/26/2021 (9:00 am to 4:00 pm @ White Oak Recreation Center):
[link omitted]
“Who else are we e-mailing with appointments? Individuals who are 75 years or older, live in Montgomery County, and have pre-registered through the County website. We are notifying individuals in waves to ensure vaccine availability and our ability to handle calls. PLEASE DO NOT FORWARD AS OTHERS MAY NOT BE ON OUR CURRENT LIST AND APPOINTMENTS WILL BE DELETED.”
I hope Connection readers can see why this method for distributing appointments is the correct method. Montgomery County figured out the way to do it correctly, but the District continues to do it BACWARDS.
Green Eyeshades says
It has been 50 days since Marlene posted this story about the “clunky web portal” for the dysfunctional vaccination appointment system created by DC Health and the Mayor’s office. Today, March 4, DCist reported that DC Health has finally made these changes to that abusive and idiotic web portal:
“Ahead of Thursday [Mar. 4], DC Health and its technology partners simplified the online questionnaire for vaccine sign-ups, removed the captcha that thwarted many residents trying to secure appointments last week, and implemented a ‘virtual waiting room’ that allowed only 3,000 users to access the questionnaire at a time. DC Health and the Office of the Chief Technology Officer also said they worked with Microsoft to increase server availability.”
https://dcist.com/story/21/03/04/vaccine-registration-covid-appointments-snapped-up-in-minutes/
(The data on vaccinations by Ward reported by DCist on March 3 was taken from DC Health’s vaccination data pages, which have stopped counting the number and percentage by Ward of residents who have received only one dose. In Ward Three, just over 27% of residents age 65-and-older have been fully vaccinated.)
Green Eyeshades says
Last night the Mayor released a “Covid-19 Situational Update” to explain new improvements to the vaccination appointment system, and to reveal new high-capacity vaccination sites. The full PDF of her March 4 Situational Update is here:
https://mayor.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/coronavirus/page_content/attachments/Situational-Update-Presentation_03-04-21.pdf
On page 19 of that PDF, the Mayor revealed that “DC Health is working with community partners to open or expand three vaccination sites that will serve as high-capacity sites where the Janssen/Johnson & Johnson one-dose vaccine will be administered.” Readers of the Connection may find it helpful that one of the high-capacity sites is the “Walter E. Washington Convention Center with George Washington Medical Faculty Associates.” Page 15 of the PDF gives the address of the Convention Center as 801 Mount Vernon Place, N.W., Washington, DC 20001, “Enter at 9th and L NW.”
The high-capacity sites are not “walk up” sites. Everyone still needs to go through the “clunky web portal” to get an appointment for a shot at one of the high-capacity sites. (The other two high-capacity sites are Providence Health System in NE and the Entertainment and Sports Arena in SE, The SE site will be staffed by Georgetown University. No addresses were provided for either of those two sites in the March 4 Situational Update.)
Many pages of the March 4 Situational Update show sample screens for the new web portal that is supposed to go live next week, but no “User Guide” has been posted yet for next week’s new portal.
This week’s version of the portal was explained in this update; it is labeled “March 1” but refers to March 4 appointments:
https://coronavirus.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/coronavirus/page_content/attachments/Vaccination-Appointment-Guide-3-4-2021.pdf
It seems possible that the “Vaccination Appointment Guide” at that link will no longer be relevant if the “new, improved” web portal is actually implemented next week.
Green Eyeshades says
Today’s “Situational Update” from the Mayor and DC Health explains the new system for requesting and making appointments for vaccinations:
https://coronavirus.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/coronavirus/release_content/attachments/Situational-Update-Presentation_03-08-21.pdf
Start on page five.
Thanks to reporters at WAMU for tweeting about the Mayor’s press conference explaining that Situational Update, which alerted me to look for the new publication on DC Health’s main Covid-19 page.
Green Eyeshades says
Local blogs have not noticed this yet, but one Post reporter tweeted about it two hours ago. Mayor Bowser and DC Health just announced the beginning of a slow rollout of CVS giving vaccinations! It will only be in Ward Five (one site) and Seven (two sites), only at three CVS locations, and will only give 3,510 doses over the next week to ten days. But it’s about time.
“Mayor Bowser and DC Health Announce New Partnership with CVS to Vaccinate Educators and School Staff, Child Care Workers, Health Care Workers, and Seniors”
https://coronavirus.dc.gov/release/mayor-bowser-and-dc-health-announce-new-partnership-cvs-vaccinate-educators-and-school-staff
Green Eyeshades says
FEMA is opening up a separate, federal, high-capacity site at Greenbelt Metro station in April:
https://dcist.com/story/21/03/29/fema-coronavirus-vaccine-site-greenbelt-metro-station/
The DCist story reveals that PG County government asked FEMA to set up the Greenbelt site, because PG County is lagging behind other parts of Maryland in vaccinating its population.
If PG County can qualify for a FEMA high-capacity site, then so can the District. It is ridiculous that the District government has not forced FEMA to open a federal high-capacity site in the District.