Wake County to offer COVID-19 vaccines in public parks in effort to expand distribution

If you live in Wake County and haven’t gotten your COVID-19 vaccine yet, it will soon be as easy as a drive to the park.

This week, Wake County Public Health will offer drive-through vaccinations in select public parks, starting with the Wendell Community Park. Appointments are required, but hundreds of slots were available as of Monday afternoon.

The county will rotate parks each week over the next three months, with clinics also planned at Green Road Park in Raleigh and Ting Park in Holly Springs.

“Our hope is that from the Wake County vaccine program standpoint, we do what we need to do to make vaccine available to anybody who wants it,” Ryan Jury, Wake County’s vaccination branch director, told The News & Observer Monday.

With vaccinations now open to anyone over 16 and supply no longer as scarce, it’s one strategy the county is using to expand availability of the COVID-19 vaccine.

Friday, the county said it is eliminating its waitlist, with people now able to schedule appointments when they want at vaccinations clinics at PNC Arena, the Wake County Commons building, Wake County Human Services Center on Departure Drive and the Wake County Public Health Center on Sunnybrook Road.

In the coming weeks, Wake County also plans to begin offering the COVID-19 vaccine at regional human services centers in Fuquay-Varina, Wake Forest and Zebulon. That is slated to start the week of April 26 with a soft opening at the Northern Regional site in Wake Forest, which will fully open the week of May 3.

“As we open these regional centers, we’ll be able to tap into communities and populations that have been waiting for the vaccine to be closer,” Jury said.

Walk-ins will be accepted soon

Wake County also plans to start offering walk-up vaccination appointments, possibly within the next week, Jury said.

It takes about 30 minutes for someone with an appointment, who already has registered with the state’s vaccination system, to go through the vaccination process. That includes the 15-minute monitoring period after the shot.

By comparison, a walk-up patient who has not registered could take 45 minutes to an hour to pass through the site.

That means that sites with walk-up vaccine availability will have less capacity than sites where shots are only available by appointment.

“As capacity allows, we will more than likely move into a walk-up model,” Jury said.

According to the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services, 400,113 people in Wake County have had at least one dose of a two-shot COVID-19 vaccine, and 289,843 people are fully vaccinated.

Vaccinating in parks

The park vaccination program is modeled after the county’s COVID-19 testing program in parks, Jury said. Since December, Wake County has been offering free COVID-19 tests, an effort that has expanded permanently to parks in Wendell and Zebulon. The health department also offers free tests at four public parks each week, with the locations rotating throughout the county.

In deciding where to put the new drive-through sites, county health officials looked at the parks where it has held testing events. They evaluated whether the parks had enough space to support a drive-through vaccination area and the parking area for the post-shot monitoring period.

Jury also said that county staff tried to space the sites out geographically. The Wendell park is located in the eastern part of the county, Ting Park is near the southern end of Wake County and the Green Road Park ensures that there will still be a drive-through clinic in Raleigh.

By offering drive-through vaccinations at public parks, Jury said, the county is preparing for the time when the parking lot at PNC Arena will no longer serve as a vaccine site.

“People want to play hockey and do other things there,” Jury said. “That’s not what it was built for.”

Wake County had planned to offer the Johnson & Johnson vaccine at the parks, but, like most providers, stopped offering that vaccine last week and is awaiting further guidance as federal agencies investigate rare blood clots that have stricken a handful of people who have received the shot.

Instead, Jury said, the vaccination sites in public parks will offer the Moderna vaccine.

Anyone who is at least 16 years old is eligible for a COVID-19 vaccine in North Carolina, but only the Pfizer vaccine has received emergency use approval for use in 16- and 17-year-olds.

To schedule an appointment, visit covid19.wakegov.com/vaccine or call 919-250-1515.