Benzie-Leelanau District Health Department Starts COVID-19 Vaccine Clinics


12 20 20 Benzie Leelanau Vax Clinic

Benzie-Leelanau District Health Department workers came in during the weekend to get a jump on administering their COVID-19 immunizations.

Director of personal health for the district, Michelle Klien says, “We’re here on a Sunday because we’re dedicated to protecting the public and doing what we can do get this vaccine out.”

She says this extra layer of protection could be the solution to stop the spread of the virus.

“Adding our vaccinations on top of doing our contact tracing.  That work is certainly not going to stop for quite sometime, but we can see that over the next six months we should start to see a decrease in cases,” said Klien.

She says that because of this, Christmas has come early for many healthcare workers.

Klien says, “I think there’s a level of excitement among all of us that we’re finally seeing this vaccine. We can finally take a step forward above and beyond contact tracing and case investigations.”

Immunization coordinator for the Benzie-Leelanau District Health Department, Autumn Jurek, says they are monitoring each patient before and after each dose.

Jurek says, “There’s a 21 day window between the first and second dose. So, first thing they do when they come in the door, we get them registered, and we set their next appointment.”

Now, they’re planning how to distribute vaccines across the two counties.

“We’ve got lists of all of the health care providers in our jurisdiction. So, they’re going to be next,” says Jurek. “We’ll do similar clinics with them but we’ve also been looking at larger spaces to accommodate more mass vaccination clinics.”

On Sunday they were able to administer 33 vaccinations to frontline workers.




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