In 
Spencer Custodio |
Orange County’s demand for the coronavirus vaccine is overwhelming the current registration system, which allows people to make an appointment to be vaccinated, causing confusion and anger for some residents.
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“The site is not friendly at all and I think it will crash. Do you think that in 2021 we could achieve what we call together. We had a year to prepare for this, ”said JoAnn Arvizu in a telephone interview on Thursday.
Arvizu, a 71-year-old Huntington Beach resident, said she was trying to get an appointment for her 77-year-old husband and she since launching the site earlier this week.
“I know how to work with a computer and yesterday he was asking us to come in and give him a password and they said that everything is ready. And then you will log in and say reset your password. This happened to my husband six times, ”said Arvizu.
She expressed frustration at not being able to get confirmation of any kind and the apparent errors on the site.
“They didn’t even ask for an email address to notify you. You have to keep visiting their website to find out if you have an appointment. So say schedule an appointment … you click on that and say to update your profile. Well, I just put my profile information there yesterday and you want me to update it? ”Said Arvizu.
She is not alone.
Dozens of elderly residents expressed concerns almost identical to Voice of OC throughout the week.
Arvizu compared the situation to the famous Abbott and Costello baseball routine.
“At the bottom of the page, say reschedule your appointment or cancel your appointment. Well, I don’t have an appointment. Who’s the first one here? I’m so mad that I don’t even want to do that. But I will keep trying, ”said Arvizu.
Othena, website and application for registering people for vaccination, was overloaded this week, causing delays in registration.
“We are experiencing exceptionally high volumes of traffic on our website at the moment,” said the Othena website early Thursday morning.
Thursday afternoon, he was back.
OC public health officials are trying to open five vaccination supersites to distribute up to 40,000 vaccinations a day by appointment – no visits are allowed. Each site must vaccinate up to 8,000 people a day.
The first was opened with a major public relations launch in Disneyland this week, after county officials announced on Tuesday that they would start vaccinating elderly people aged 65 and over.
However, county officials were apparently not ready for a mass response.
“The volume of people trying to get an appointment is so high that the system can be overwhelmed. As you know, the server can only handle a certain number of calls and sometimes hangs. Be patient. If it is not available today, try again in the future, ”said the chairman of supervisors, Andrew Do, during a news conference on Wednesday at Disneyland.
Do said they are solving the problem by trying to get more bandwidth to handle the high volume of records.
He also said that the move to open Disneyland’s supersite is an effort to prove to state officials that Orange County is capable of mass vaccinations so they can get more vaccines in the future.
“It is part of the intention to show the state that Orange County has a mechanism and process in place to administer the vaccine in an efficient and timely manner,” said Do. “The state guides its action a lot based on the municipality’s performance. And with the effort of the vaccine, it is no different. ”
It is unclear when the other four supersites will open.
Approximately 280,000 vaccines per week are needed to maximize all five super sites.
The president of the Orange County Medical Association, Dr. Jason Cord, said that while he understands the community’s frustration at not being able to register, it at least shows that waves of people are ready to get the vaccine.
“We know that at the beginning, the Othena website will be overwhelmed. We’ll get over it – I recommend that people keep checking … Each time it fills, a large group of people are being vaccinated. In a way, it is encouraging to see that we have less hesitation and more enthusiasm for the vaccine, ”said Cord in a telephone interview on Thursday.
Cord said he personally understands the frustration.
“I have two parents aged 80 and over. So, I’m helping them get into the app, ”said Cord. “It is a challenge because we all know that the site has been flooded.”
Vaccination clinics for health professionals were closed earlier this week because people without an appointment flocked to them in hopes of being vaccinated.
“The three existing counties [vaccination] the sites were overloaded by individuals without an appointment, effectively closing the vaccination sites. It is essential that people understand that the available times are available based on the availability of the vaccine. Appearing without an appointment stresses the system and depletes scarce resources, ”county officials said on a Tuesday. press release.
Meanwhile, local health officials expect an additional 35,000 doses in the next week.
“This morning, we have just been informed by the state … we will receive another 35,000 doses next week,” said county health officer, Dr. Clayton Chau, at a news conference on Wednesday. “Every week we receive an assignment.”
While people eagerly await the vaccine, deaths from viruses have steadily increased.
The virus has killed 2,195 people out of 202,753 confirmed cases, including 16 new deaths reported today, according to the county Health Agency.
The agency has reported nearly 300 new deaths since the beginning of the year.
Recently reported deaths may extend to weeks due to delays in notification.
Arvizu said the deaths were hitting their homes as the virus spread.
“I had deceased friends, unfortunately. It used to be someone well below the line that you didn’t know, ”she said.
The virus has killed more than three times as many people as the flu on an annual average.
For context, Orange County has averaged about 20,000 deaths per year since 2016, including 543 annual deaths from influenza, according to state health data.
According to state mortality statistics, cancer kills more than 4,600 people, heart disease kills more than 2,800, more than 1,400 die from Alzheimer’s disease and strokes kill more than 1,300 people.
Orange County has already surpassed its annual average of 20,000 deaths, with 21,110 deaths by November, according to the latest state data available.
It is a difficult virus to be fought by the medical community because some people have no symptoms, but they can still spread it. Others experience mild symptoms, such as fatigue and moderate fever.
Others end up in the ICU for days and weeks before escaping, while others die from the virus.
The agency also reported a further 3,221 new cases of viruses on Thursday.
Orange County is receiving an average of approximately 3,500 new cases a day in the past week.
State public health officials estimate that about 12% of newly infected people end up hospitalized in three weeks.
Throughout the week, Chau said repeatedly that the decision to include people aged 65 and over in the first round of vaccination is an effort to prevent them from being hospitalized.
On Tuesday, Chau told county supervisors that just over half of all OC hospitalizations are people aged 65 and over.
Cord said he supports the move.
“We know that our ICUs and hospitals are stressed,” he said. “So, if we want to flatten the hospital utilization curve, not just flatten the curve in general, we have to solve this.”
For more details on the COVID-19 vaccine in Orange County, see our Voice of OC information page: http://bit.ly/occovidvaccine.
Here is the latest information on virus numbers in Orange County from county data:
Infections | Hospitalizations and deaths | City to city data | Demography
Spencer Custodio is a reporter on the Voice of OC team. You can reach it at [email protected] Follow him on Twitter @SpencerCustodio