Wesley Blixt finally got his first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine on March 2, but not before feeling a lot of frustration and almost giving up, similar to what many across Franklin County have felt and expressed over the past several weeks.
“I was at it for three weeks straight,” said Blixt, 69. “I feel so bad for the folks still floundering because I was there. I’ve been a journalist and teacher my entire career, and I just couldn’t navigate the system. Those feelings of helplessness, hopelessness and isolation were foreign to me.”
The South Deerfield resident said he fretted over having to navigate the vaccine sign-up system.
“It was broken from the beginning,” he said. “You’d be told you could sign up for the vaccine in an hour, and you’d be sitting at your computer trying for many hours and never get an appointment. It was a shot in the dark.”
Blixt was able to secure an appointment for his first shot last week and made his second appointment for the end of March.
“I hear stories about folks not being able to get an appointment, folks who are older than me,” he said. “I feel so bad for them. I realize that could still be me. It’s the luck of the draw.”
Blixt said he was just about ready to give up.
“I felt absolute loneliness,” he said. “I have never felt this way, but I felt like a doddering old man. I just kept saying, ‘My God, someone please help me, please tell me what to do.’ I was on the verge of tears so many times.”
Blixt said he tried to make an appointment at the clinic run by the city of Greenfield, Big Y, CVS and the four towns that are working with the Franklin Regional Council of Governments (FRCOG) on rotating weeks. He said the first shot went well and he’s looking forward to the second.
“No one deserves to be left wanting a vaccine,” he said. “Some are scared, alone, and they’re left feeling even worse by a chaotic system. I hope everyone who wants one gets a vaccine as soon as possible. The only other message I have is ‘Don’t give up.’”
FRCOG Emergency Preparedness Program Manager Tracy Rogers said the county is vaccinating people as fast as it can with the vaccines it is allotted each week.
“Everyone finds out late Friday afternoon how many vaccines they will have for the following week,” Rogers said. “On Monday, people can start signing up.”
FRCOG, the city of Greenfield (which administers 500 vaccines per clinic on average) and others are working with state legislators, including state Sen. Jo Comerford, D-Northampton, and state Rep. Paul Mark, D-Peru, to make sure Franklin County receives its share and that those vaccines go mostly to the people who live within the county. They are doing all that they can to prevent out-of-region registrations.
Mayor Roxann Wedegartner has said that while she doesn’t like refusing anyone, because everyone who wants a vaccine should be able to get one, she doesn’t want internet bots filling the registration slots at the clinic at the John Zon Community Center on Pleasant Street, leaving Franklin County with few options or forcing seniors to travel to get one.
FRCOG is also working with the state Department of Public Health and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to determine how to meet the requirement of having registration links appear on the state website, rather than just the local website as area officials had hoped, while making sure Franklin County residents are a priority.
Large-volume clinics are held at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Eastfield Mall in Springfield. CVS and Big Y are also vaccinating people, and doctors’ offices are calling the patients who are eligible to set up appointments for first and second doses.
Greenfield’s clinic is currently open three days per week and an appointment is needed. There are also several towns that alternate weeks in providing clinics: South Deerfield, Buckland, Bernardston and Montague. Orange also holds a clinic in coordination with FRCOG.
For more information or to make an appointment at one of the clinics, visit bit.ly/2OfHB5k.
To make an appointment in Greenfield, email vaccine.clinics@greenfield-ma.gov (the preferred method) or call 413-775-6411 and leave a message with your name and contact information.
Reach Anita Fritz at 413-772-9591 or afritz@recorder.com.