Photographer: Johnny Milano / Bloomberg
Photographer: Johnny Milano / Bloomberg
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Vaccine scheduling software from Microsoft Corp. widely used, which has struggled in states like Iowa and New Jersey, is being blamed for problems that have left some residents of the nation’s capital unable to make appointments.
After three consecutive days of problems with the District of Columbia online vaccination record, the technology company based in Redmond, Washington, issued a statement with the city government acknowledging “that our efforts were insufficient” and promising to resolve the problems .
“We understand the frustration of individuals who tried to use the District’s vaccination booking portal this week,” they said. “We are committed to addressing technical issues so that the vaccination booking portal is properly functional and accessible.”
The problems in DC represent another black eye for Microsoft, which has been highly praising its software as a way to help with rapid vaccine deployment and programming. In recent years, the software giant has increasingly focused on hospital and healthcare systems as customers of its cloud and artificial intelligence systems, including the launch of a cloud software package tailored to the industry last year.
Frustrated users of the system accessed Twitter to express a litany of complaints, including Captcha response tests that don’t work, error messages saying the service was not available, and the web page crashes.
“It was a deeply frustrating experience,” said Adam Beitman, 36, who spent 40 minutes trying to use the site after discovering that his asthma was qualified as a pre-existing condition. “It is not clear how a website can be so dysfunctional. I don’t even know if I got the appointment or not. “
Washington’s mayor’s office, Muriel Bowser, forwarded questions about the specific cause of the problems to the city’s health department, which did not respond to emails and voice messages seeking comment.
‘Very frustrating’
“We know this morning was very frustrating for a lot of people,” DC Health said on Twitter Thursday. “We are working with Microsoft to understand why the heavy traffic has caused some qualified individuals to fail to get through.
Vincent Gray, a member of the District of Columbia Council who chairs the health committee, said he plans to hold a hearing on March 4 to investigate the problems.
The problems occur after failures in the Microsoft system that have led at least one state to cancel a contract with the technology company. Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds said earlier this month, the state was giving up on a plan to use Microsoft software to register patients and schedule Covid-19 vaccinations “after learning more about the breadth of Microsoft’s solution and analyzing the challenges faced by some other states”.
In New Jersey, Governor Phil Murphy complained about significant flaws in the vaccination scheduling system built by Microsoft, which was marked by problems for weeks after being released.