How can I register to get the COVID vaccine in Georgia? What you need to know
COVID-19 vaccines will soon be available to Georgia senior citizens, emergency responders and healthcare workers.
Starting Monday, Jan. 11, Georgians who meet the following criteria are eligible to register for the vaccine at their local health department:
Healthcare personnel likely to be exposed to or treat people with COVID-19, including nurses, physicians, EMS, laboratory technicians, environmental services.
Long-term care facilities staff and residents.
First responders, including law enforcement, fire personnel (and volunteer fire departments), dispatchers, 9-1-1 operators.
People at increased risk for severe illness from COVID-19, including those with underlying medical conditions.
People 65 years of age and older and their caregivers.
Other essential workers.
Vaccinations are available by appointment only. Patients should reach out to their regional health district to schedule an appointment. Many Georgia health districts are scheduling appointments via phone or with vaccine registration forms available on their websites.
Health officials will contact individuals to schedule an appointment after they submit a vaccination request form.
Vaccine doses in Georgia are limited. Vaccinations are available only to those who fall into the current phase of vaccine distribution.
According to data from the Department of Public Health’s vaccine dashboard, 135,605 doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been administered in Georgia.
To find the health department in your area and get more information about registering for a vaccine, select your county in the map below.
Vaccine updates for Georgia
Georgia now has the capacity to administer 11,428 doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines per day, said Gov. Brian Kemp in a press conference Friday. About 80,000 doses can be administered each week.
With a population of more than 10 million people, it will take months for Georgia to vaccinate everyone. Doses are spread out among the state’s 159 counties and administered through regional health departments.
“We’re gonna use every single resource that we have in the state to get this vaccine in people’s arms, but we also got to have an ample supply,” Kemp said.
As of Friday, the state has administered 24.48% of vaccines that have been delivered to Georgia, Kemp said.
Governor Kemp addressed the new, highly-contagious variant of COVID-19 that was recently confirmed in Georgia.
“When Colorado had the strain, I figured we had it,” Kemp said. “If it’s in the middle of the country, you got to figure it’s in just about every state or it will be soon.”
Kemp issued a new executive order Thursday that allows emergency medical technicians (EMTs) and cardiac technicians to administer the vaccine to eligible patients in Georgia. Kemp estimates that this adds more than 10,000 people who can legally administer vaccines.
State officials believe there is significant underreporting of vaccinations, Kemp said. Officials inspected immunization records and found that hospitals who had received thousands of vaccine doses reported vaccinations in the single or double digits, says Ryan Loke, the governor’s deputy chief operating officer.
Overburdened hospitals may have neglected to formally report vaccinations due to high workload. A large uptick in vaccination rates is expected in the coming days as the backlog is entered into the state’s immunization records system, Loke said.
“This has been and will continue to be a heavy logistical lift for the state of Georgia,” Kemp said.
The Governor recently expanded the criteria of Phase 1A of vaccine distribution to include adults over the age of 60, among others. The reason behind this expansion was a larger supply of the vaccine than a demand for it in rural areas of Georgia, Kemp said Friday.
“What we were simply trying to do was make sure that we didn’t have vaccines sitting in a freezer somewhere,” Kemp said.
This story was originally published January 8, 2021 at 3:10 PM.