YNHH Signs Up 1,600 For Vaccine Phase 1B

Over 1,600 eligible seniors have signed up since Thursday night to be vaccinated by Yale New Haven Health — while the regional hospital system works with the city health department to set up a site at Hillhouse High School’s Floyd Little Fieldhouse.

YNHH Senior Vice President, Public Affairs Vin Petrini gave those updates Friday morning during an interview with the Independent about the hospital system’s Phase 1B vaccine rollout.

Those details came one day after Gov. Ned Lamont announced that the state plans to transition to a broader phase of the statewide Covid-19 vaccination plan starting this coming Monday.

That phase will include up to 1.3 million people statewide. Ultimately it will cover residents over the age of 75, those between 65 and 74, those between 16 and 64 who have co-morbidities, essential frontline workers, and those who live and work in congregate settings.

At first, as of Thursday, residents aged 75 and older can start making appointments through the state or with participating healthcare providers to get vaccinated.

“Patience is the watchword,” Petrini said Friday. ​“We know there’s a high demand here. There will be enough vaccine here in Connecticut. We will make sure that it is accessible for all members of the community. It may take a few days, a few weeks. But we will make sure everyone has access to a vaccine.”

Highlights of the immediate stages of YNHH’s Phase 1B vaccine plan include:

• As of 7 p.m. Thursday night, YNHH’s online vaccine appointment registration form is live on their website. Click here if you are 75 or older and want to schedule an appointment. Some Independent readers reached out with concerns Thursday afternoon about how Hartford Healthcare and UCONN Health Center were accepting appointments, but YNHH was not. ​“We just wanted to make sure it was ready to roll,” Petrini said about YNHH’s online registration system. He said that 400 eligible seniors booked vaccination appointments within 45 minutes of the form going live. As of 8 a.m. Friday, 1,600 people had registered appointments. ​“There’s clear demand,” Petrini said.

• YNHH is currently ​“staffing up” a hospital-specific vaccine hotline for people who have questions about the vaccine or want to make an appointment but do not want to do that online. The YNHH phone number is 833 – 275-9644 (833-ASK-YNHH). Petrini warned that the hospital’s phone line and website have been overrun in the past day with people wanting to know more about the vaccine. If you call this YNHH number, you may have to wait and you may not reach someone immediately, Petrini cautioned. The state has also set up a statewide hotline run by the Department of Public Health and United Way at 877 – 918-2224.

• YNHH will be administering Phase 1B vaccinations to start at its Northeast Medical Group buildings. The closest such site to New Haven is at 4 Devine St. in North Haven. Petrini said that the hospital system will not be vaccinating Phase 1B recipients at its New Haven’s hospital campuses on York Street and at St. Raphael’s to start, because the vaccinations taking place at those sites are still reserved for healthcare workers who fall into Phase 1A. Petrini said that YNHH has vaccinated 24,212 eligible healthcare workers through Phase 1A so far, with 14,700 of those taking place at Yale New Haven Hospital. He said that over 1,000 of those vaccinated so far have received their second doses.

• The hospital is currently working with the city Health Department to set up a vaccination site at Hillhouse High School’s Floyd Little Fieldhouse. ​“We hope to open it in the next week or 10 days,” Petrini said. The city Health Department listed Floyd Little Fieldhouse as one prospective public vaccination site in its Covid-19 mass vaccination plan.

Mayor Justin Elicker confirmed Friday afternoon that YNHH representatives and city officials did a walkthrough of the Floyd Little Fieldhouse on Friday as part of the preparations for converting it into a vaccination site. He said the city hopes to have the site open by the end of January. He said the site will likely be staffed by city Health Department workers, YNHH staff, and Medical Reserve Corp volunteers. ​“The goal is to ensure that as many people as possible get vaccinated as easily as possible.” When up and running, he said, staff at that site should be able to vaccinate between 1,000 and 2,000 people a day.

• Petrini confirmed that you do not have to be an existing YNHH patient and you do not have to have MyChart in order to schedule a vaccination appointment with YNHH. Patients will not be charged anything out of pocket to be vaccinated, he said, though their insurance plans will be billed ​“a small administrative charge” after the vaccine has been administered.

• Does YNHH have enough vaccine doses to handle demand, even for this first wave of residents 75 and older? ​“We will only make slots avaiable with the doses that we have,” Petrini said. That is, so long as the hospital has supply, it will allow people to make appointments. Once that supply runs out, it will pause appointments until the hospital gets a new weekly set of doses from the state.

• Click here and watch the video above to see YNHH’s answers to many, many more questions about the vaccine.

Mayor: ​“Please Be Patient”

On Thursday night, Mayor Justin Elicker sent out a mass email with information from the city’s side on the coming Phase 1B vaccine rollout. Read that full email below.

Hi everyone,

This is Mayor Justin Elicker with a message about COVID-19 vaccinations. We are currently in phase 1A of the vaccination roll-out which includes individuals working in the medical sector. The City’s Health Department has already vaccinated over 2,100 people.

This coming Monday, January 18th, phase 1B will begin. Phase 1B includes many high-risk groups that will be eligible to receive vaccines.

At this moment, if you are 75 years old or older, you can sign up now for an appointment to get vaccinated either by logging in online to the CT VAMS system, calling 211, or calling the State-run Vaccine Appointment Assistance hotline at 1 – 877-918‑2224. Again, if you are 75 years old or older, you can sign up for a vaccination appointment now. Additionally, 2 – 1‑1 can set up a ride for you if you need transportation to your vaccination appointment.

Other categories of individuals in phase 1b include frontline essential workers, individuals ages 65 – 74 years old, individuals with comorbidities who are 16 – 64 years old and individuals living in congregate settings. Scheduling will occur soon for these categories as the State continues to implement the vaccination phase 1b. Please be patient.

If you are an employer of frontline workers, you are encouraged to submit your employee rosters for vaccination appointments on the CT VAMS system on the state website.

We have a lot more work to do, but we are making good progress New Haven. I want to thank Health Director Maritza Bond and her team at the Health Department for the hard work of getting New Haveners vaccinated. Stay safe, everyone! 

Always serving you,

Mayor Justin Elicker
(203) 500‑2969