The New Your Times had a terrific piece this week highlighting the innovative work that Gila County Public Health has been doing to get their communities vaccinated.
Short take is that they went rogue and avoided falling into the trap of adopting ADHS directives. By and large- they have opened up vaccinations without requiring an up-front appointment which allows residents to bypass the buggy ADHS appointment system. Here are some excerpts from the piece in the NY Times entitled: Can’t Get a Covid Vaccine? In This County, Everybody is Eligible
Health officials say they also adopted a more imaginative approach to vaccinations, especially after Gila County moved past the phases for vaccinating teachers, child care workers and people 65 and older.
Gila County started off with a set of qualifying standards as well. But it has been so successful at vaccinating its residents that it is now one of the first places in the United States to open eligibility to the general population, offering a glimpse of what vaccination could start to look like in the rest of the country weeks or months from now.
Doctors and nurses on the front lines in Gila County said they were able to open up vaccinations for all adult residents only after meeting targets for vaccinating high-risk groups like seniors and essential workers. Because they did so well, Arizona state officials allotted the county a larger number of doses, enabling it to become one of the few places in the country that could offer the vaccine to whole adult population.
I don’t live in Gila County- but from the sounds of this article local control and local decisions seem to be satisfying the residents of Gila County. That doesn’t mean that their approach would be appropriate or accepted everywhere- but at least for that part of the state folks seem to be OK with it.