LANCASTER, Pa. — The Vaccinate Lancaster Coalition is asking those who no longer need a vaccine to cancel their appointment in order to open up appointments for others.
Nearly 30,000 people have gotten their first shot at the Lancaster Community Vaccination Center at Park City.
An even greater number, however, haven’t responded to email invitations to schedule their appointment. Slightly more than half of the 75,000 invitations sent out have been scheduled.
Many of the others who have not made an appointment may have missed the email, members of Vaccinate Lancaster Coalition said.
“One of the things we found out about the invitations is you only receive it one time,” said Dr. Michael R. Ripchinski, chief clinical officer at Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health and the Lancaster vaccine site director. “I want to encourage everybody to go back into their email, look for emails from Vaccinate Lancaster, and you may find it in your spam, you may find it in your deleted items.”
Some Lancaster County officials say the issue is a byproduct of the state’s decision not to have a centralized registration system.
“Largely it’s a function of how the state rolled out vaccines to start with, which is the fragmented approach. Some people signed up for 10 different lists,” said Lancaster Commissioner Joshua Parsons.
Many who managed to schedule their vaccine somewhere else did not cancel their request through Vaccinate Lancaster.
“We want people who actually need the vaccine, not people who have gotten it other places,” Parsons said. “So we’re asking people to get off the list if they’ve gotten it already.”
Those who no longer need a vaccine appointment are asked to call 717-588-1020 and select option 5 to deactivate their registration.
Vaccinate Lancaster officials hope to offer an appointment to all Lancastrians eligible in Phase 1A before eligibility opens to more people.
President Joe Biden has directed states to open eligibility to all adults by May 1.
“We’re at a place where there are empty appointments. All of you have a chance to potentially schedule but that’s going to get harder as we get into 1B and 1C because those who have been waiting for a vaccine may ultimately take those appointments,” Ripchinski said.
The open appointments are all for first doses. Vaccinate Lancaster will start second-dose vaccines in early April.