B.C.’s age-based COVID-19 vaccine program to open to ages 50-and-older in the coming week

As of Friday, messages will go out to those 56 and older, with the lower age limit decreasing by two years every two days until Thursday (May 6).

Meantime, a day after Health Minister Adrian Dix noted the province had nearly exhausted its supply of AstraZeneca vaccine, Interior Health is opening up more opportunities to receive that brand.

“We’ve… had our AstraZeneca supply replenished, which is allowing us to resume some frontline worker immunization,” said Chief Medical Health Officer Dr. Albert de Villiers in a technical briefing Friday (Apr. 30). “We started this week with educators in the Central Okanagan.”

The province has now opened up pharmacy-based AstraZeneca campaign to anyone aged 30 or older.

De Villiers notes AstraZeneca has been sent to pharmacies in Castelgar, Cranbrook, Kamloops, Kelowna, Lake Country, Penticton, Vernon and West Kelowna.

With a supply of the newly-approved Johnson and Johnson vaccine arriving in B.C. next week, de Villiers says it’s unclear how it will be deployed.

“I haven’t heard the decision about the Johnson and Johnson (vaccine),” he said. “We know that it’s coming in the next week or so; we will probably have some doses of that, but the final decision as to what’s going to happen with that, we haven’t heard yet.”

To register through the Province of B.C.’s age-based vaccination program, click here.

To check for availability of the AstraZeneca vaccine through the B.C. Pharmacy Association website, click here.

by James Peters

B.C.’s age-based COVID-19 vaccine program to open to ages 50-and-older in the coming week

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