The Alabama Department of Public Health says state hospitals are “overwhelmed” with calls from people asking to receive the COVID-19 vaccine and asks the public not to call hospitals directly to schedule an appointment.
Within hours of announcing that the state planned to start vaccinating anyone over 75 and more essential workers on January 18, ADPH said Alabama hospitals were flooded with calls from people seeking to make an appointment, and that the number of calls is creating problems for these hospitals.
“Please do not call the local hospital directly to make an appointment to receive your COVID-19 vaccine,” the department said in a press release on Friday.
“We learned that hospital centers are overloaded with connections, which is creating an obstacle to patient care,” says the note. “Hospitals across Alabama are overwhelmed with providing care to both COVID-19 patients, as well as responding to all of our citizens’ other medical needs.”
Alabama is currently vaccinating only people in Phase 1a of its plan, frontline health workers and some first responders, as well as people who have extensive contact with COVID patients through their jobs, including lab and morgue staff. Some areas have started offering vaccines to other groups, if they have sufficient supplies, but this has been done mainly in the county’s health departments.
“Although hospitals in some areas of the state have started vaccinating people aged 75 and over, most are still working to ensure that their frontline workers are vaccinated,” said ADPH. “Additional information will be provided when hospitals and locations other than county health departments have vaccine available for additional groups.”
ADPH launched a statewide vaccine scheduling hotline on Friday also for people to call 1-855-566-5333. Calls are answered from 8 am to 5 pm, seven days a week, but ADPH says the line received more than 1.1 million calls on its first day of operation.
As a result, ADPH is asking people to call the hotline only if they are eligible to receive the vaccine on or before January 18, that is, people over 75 or working in jobs listed in Phase 1a or 1b of the allocation of vaccine from the flat state.
“Please don’t call the consultation line if you don’t qualify to schedule a vaccine right now,” said ADPH on Saturday. “Due to the large number of calls, our target population is unable to schedule appointments.
“COVID-19 vaccination appointments are currently available only to health professionals, people aged 75 and over, and first responders (including police and firefighters). Vaccine demand continues to exceed supply in Alabama, with more than 300,000 health workers and nearly 350,000 people who qualify for a vaccine at age 75 or older. “
ADPH said that people with general questions about the vaccine and who do not want to schedule appointments to receive it can call 1-800-270-7268.
ADPH also provided a list of hospitals and medical facilities that received the vaccine as of January 6, although more locations are added as the state receives more vaccine shipments.
In Birmingham, the Jefferson County Department of Health also has a hotline for vaccine information at 205-858-2221. Jefferson County residents can also send a text message to 888777 with the INFOJEFFCO message to sign up for COVID-19 vaccine text message updates.
* Updated at 10:15 with additional ADPH information.