Alabama Governor Kay Ivey announced on Monday that the state would create an online portal to help the state’s overcrowded vaccine hotline.
Alabama has created a toll-free phone number for people qualified to receive the vaccine to call to schedule appointments. This hotline was announced on Friday and received 1.1 million calls on the first day, according to the Alabama Department of Public Health.
“We are working to improve our registration capabilities by creating an online portal in addition to the hotline,” Ivey said in a tweet on Monday. “We will provide more information when it becomes available.”
Ivey announced last week that Alabama would begin offering vaccines to people over 75 or more categories of essential workers from January 18. Since that announcement, ADPH, hospitals and local health departments have been inundated with calls from people seeking to make an appointment to receive the vaccine.
Ivey did not say when the online portal would be launched.
The state also reported that hospitals are receiving many calls from people trying to schedule appointments to receive the vaccine, and asked people not to call hospitals directly, but to use the hotline.
Jefferson County, the most populous county in the state and home of Birmingham, has created an online registry for people in that county to apply to be notified when they are eligible to receive the vaccine and how to schedule an appointment.
Ivey asked people to be patient until the online portal was launched and to call the hotline only if you were eligible to schedule an appointment. At the moment, the state is just scheduling appointments for health professionals, rescuers and people over 75.
“In the meantime, we ask the public for patience and to call the hotline only if you are eligible,” said Ivey. “If you get a busy signal, try calling again later. We need everyone’s help to do this job. “