If your vaccine wait isn’t over already, it will be soon! Gov. Brown recently announced that all Oregon residents aged 16-and-up will be eligible for vaccine appointments on April 19th (that’s next Monday!). That doesn’t mean appointments will be easy to get. By then, Oregon will have only received about 2 million doses of vaccine for nearly 4 million eligible people. But unlike the great toilet paper crisis of 2020 (see photo below of a lifetime supply of Charmin), no one will be hoarding surplus vaccine doses in their basement — so the logjam should pass relatively quickly.
Where to get your vaccine appointment:
Start here: https://govstatus.egov.com/
- Oregon Convention Center: Sign up here and you will be sent an invitation when a vaccine is available to you. Names are selected at random from the eligible pool.
- OHSU drive-thru clinics at Hillsboro Stadium and PDX Airport Red Economy Lot: Schedule online via OHSU’s tool. New appointments are released Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays at 9 a.m. (subject to change).
- Vaccine appointments at local pharmacies:
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GoodRx vaccine appointment tracker scans all the pharmacy websites in your area every couple minutes and reports what’s available. https://www.goodrx.com/covid-
19/vaccine -
This site works similarly https://www.vaccinespotter.
org/OR/
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I’m vaccinated. Now what?
Multnomah and Clackamas Counties are back in the “High Risk” category. This means that cases have risen above 100 per 100k population, and businesses like restaurants and bars will need to reduce indoor capacity down to 25 percent. Click here for a complete list of restrictions.
Please remain cautious! Less than half of the population has been able to get the vaccine. In general, fewer economic restrictions in Oregon and elsewhere means more opportunities to be in proximity to people who could be carriers.
It is indeed possible to get COVID after being vaccinated. We have already seen a couple of these cases in our clinic. Let’s protect ourselves and others by not letting down our guard prematurely. Wear masks. Wash hands. And maintain physical distance, unless you know for sure that those outside your household have been completely immunized (that’s two weeks past shot number 2 of the Moderna or Pfizer vaccines, or 2 weeks past the one-shot Johnson and Johnson).
What to expect moving forward?
There are no clear answers yet. As more people get vaccinated, life will begin to feel more like it did pre-pandemic. Some states, like Texas, are forcing this issue a bit prematurely. Others, like California, have announced the winding down of restrictions in the coming months. And Oregon is still taking things pretty slowly.
We do know that there will be more cases. We expect there will be localized outbreaks and probably even larger waves in some areas. But the effectiveness of these vaccines should mean a significant decrease in hospitalizations and deaths.
In our office, fully vaccinated patients are now being given the option to return to masked, in-person visits (in other words, we drop the video interview component). For the future, our experiences with telemedicine visits lead us to believe that this method of care delivery is here to stay — just like other forms of remote work.
Socially, our fully vaccinated friends and family members are allowed back into our homes. But we’ve found that Zoom has brought us closer to people who live far away. Some of us are back in the gym. And some have learned that they prefer to exercise at home after all.
Societally, professionally, and personally, we feel cautious and optimistic as we venture towards a future that includes publicly exposed noses and chins.
Who doesn’t love Dolly? And after she gave a million dollars to vaccine development, we were so excited to see her finally get vaccinated.
Take care,
Baskin Clinic