A massive 280,000-square-foot Coronavirus - COVID-19 vaccination site with a streamlined drive-through process opened at 13th Avenue and K Street near Petco Park in downtown San Diego today.
County and city officials created what they call the "vaccination superstation" in less than five days, including at least two dozen tents and several temporary structures to house the vaccines and provide staff.
The announcement came when the county reported 3,288 new cases and 33 deaths from COVID-19, bringing the area's death toll to 1,857. There were 32 additional patients hospitalized and four treated in intensive care units as of Saturday, county officials said.
The program is held in collaboration with the University of California, San Diego, and the San Diego Padres, who provided the tailgate parking lot near Petco Park and wireless Internet and event staff to help handle parking and direct traffic.
At least 300 U.C. San Diego physicians, nurses, and other staff members are authorized to give the first round of injections to fellow health care workers. Their goal is to administer 5,000 appointment shots a day.
Patty Maysent, CEO of U.C. San Diego Health, said, "As we open up more capacity, it fills really quickly. So be patient and keep coming back to [the website], but we really encourage those health care workers in Tier 1 to come here and get vaccinated if they can, as soon as possible. We'll try to get as much capacity as we can to make that happen."
Supervisor Nathan Fletcher said, "We will learn a lot of things [Monday] and we will apply those in real-time [Monday] and Tuesday and then really apply those lessons as we build out greater infrastructure around," said , who added the next site will be in the South Bay, but a specific location has not yet been identified.
San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria, who attended the media event Sunday to unveil the new site, said, "This kind of collaboration is going to be the new normal. "This will be the new business as usual when it comes to how our governments at the local level will collaborate.
"None of this is free," Gloria said. "The message is simple, Washington. We need additional economic relief."
There are approximately 500,000 people in San Diego County who are currently eligible to receive the vaccine, but the first round of shots is only available to health care workers.
San Diego County Supervisor Nathan Fletcher said he hopes to open up the site to others eligible when the vaccine becomes more widely available, but that will depend on the availability of vaccines in the coming weeks.
"We're operating under the assumption that if we move faster and we use everything we have in our county, that we ought to be first in line to get more," Fletcher said. "
So that requires us to take a leap of faith . There is a possibility that we could stand up all of this infrastructure and run out of vaccines while we push for more, but we would rather have that problem than the opposite, where we're not getting (more vaccines) because we're not prepared."
County officials said health care workers could first contact their healthcare providers for the vaccine, but if unsuccessful, they can visit the county's new vaccine superstation at www.VaccinationSuperStationSD.com.
San Diego County also has four smaller locations for vaccines in San Diego, El Cajon, Escondido, and Chula Vista. The coronavirus vaccine is also available through pharmacies, primary care facilities, and establishments overseen by the Veterans Health Administration.