'Booster Blitz' signups open Wednesday
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Dec. 1—Granite Staters can expect longer wait times for COVID-19 booster shot appointments in the weeks ahead as record-high cases and the prospect of a new variant is driving up demand, Gov. Chris Sununu said Tuesday.
The state will open registration for its Dec. 11 one-day "Booster Blitz" on its vaccine website (vaccines.nh.gov) at 8 a.m. today. Families can register up to five people at a time for boosters.
The blitz will allow 10,000 residents to get a booster shot at 15 locations across the state. It will likely be repeated in the future, Sununu said.
The shots will be offered at locations in Berlin, Claremont, Colebrook, Concord, Hanover, Keene, Laconia, Manchester, Milford, North Conway, Plymouth, Rochester, Salem, Stratham and Woodsville.
"It's a combination of factors that are causing a big crunch on the system, but understand we have over half a million people who could get their boosters," Sununu said. "That can't happen overnight; people might have to wait three days, a week or a few days more."
When the vaccine was first rolled out last spring, the state offered it in "chunks" to segments of the population, but now many of the more than 500,000 who got fully vaccinated are seeking a booster shot, he said.
Many who didn't sign up for vaccinations when they first became eligible are seeking it now due to the late fall surge of COVID-19, much of it linked to the more contagious delta variant, Sununu said.
"Unfortunately, it is kind of what we have been saying — people need to see it right in front of them before they act," Sununu said.
School clinics offering COVID-19 shots for students older than 5 will take some of the pressure off the network of providers offering boosters, he added.
