The Fraser Health Authority (FHA) had a good start on Monday as the provincial health authority began accepting appointments for a free COVID-19 vaccine.
But the same could not be said for several other health authorities, namely Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH) who had its call centres flooded with calls, with thousands not able to get through.
Health Minister Adrian Dix, on Tuesday in the legislature, called out Telus Corp. for its performance facilitating the first day of COVID-19 vaccine appointments after bottlenecks hit call centres hard.
“Vancouver Coastal Health was fully dependent on our call centre provider to provide services based on the contract they had signed with us and the promises they repeatedly made about being prepared. That contractor, the provider, Telus, failed us yesterday,” said Dix. “For that failure, a lot of people wasted time, and I think lost some confidence in the system — confidence that we'll have to work hard to rebuild at every level in terms of both technical issues that affected all health authorities and staffing issues.”
Dix revealed on Monday that 1.7 million calls were placed to call centres throughout the province within the first three hours of lines opening up at 7 a.m.
By the end of the day, only 369 appointments were booked for the VCH region.
About 82,000 British Columbians are currently eligible to book — 47,000 people 90 years old or above, and 35,000 Indigenous people 65 years or older — while 26,000 people in those eligible groups have already received at least one dose.
Here in the FHA, booking can be done by calling 1-855-755-2455 or online at: www.fraserhealth.ca/vaccinebooking.
The FHA is the only local health authority that rolled out an online booking platform on Monday.
The remaining four health authorities were dependent on call centres.
Out of the 10,000 or so appointments booked Monday, 8,722 were made through Fraser Health.
Dix said Monday a province-wide online booking platform will be ready to launch April 12 as the province begins vaccinating the broader population in the coming weeks.
Booking eligibility will expand to those 85 years and older by March 15, and 80 years and older by March 22.
Vaccinations for elderly British Columbians begin March 29 as the province continues to prioritize vulnerable groups and frontline health-care workers for vaccinations over the next three weeks.
In South Delta the vaccination clinic will be at the Delta COVID-19 testing and immunization centre located at 4470 Clarence Taylor Cres. It is open from 8:45 a.m. to 3 p.m. daily.
During a media conference call on Sunday, Dr. Victoria Lee, Fraser Health president and CEO said a clinic at the North Delta Rec. Centre would be opening in the coming weeks.
“There is a Delta location in South Delta that will be available for immunizations starting on March 15. We received the concerns and suggestions that Mayor [George] Harvie highlighted from the municipality and we have been working with our partners to see if we could make one of the North Delta facilities work. We are confident that we will have the Rec. Centre in North Delta available in the coming weeks,” said Lee. “In the meantime, there are options in the Surrey area as well as South Delta.”
Harvie told the Optimist, that he is pleased that a letter he sent to Fraser Health as well as Premier John Horgan last week with the message urging that a North Delta clinic be opened, was well received.
“I’m glad they listened and took that into consideration,” said Harvie. “I have directed our staff to meet today (Sunday). Our staff will be taking steps immediately to ensure it is available at a moments’ notice.”
For a full list of all the current clinics in the FHA see: www.fraserhealth.ca/vaccineclinic.
Meanwhile, the B.C. Centre for Disease Control released its latest monthly COVID-19 map on Monday showing how many people overall in each community had contracted the virus. Covering the period January 2020 to the end of February 2021, the provincial map indicates the City of Delta had 2,723 cases of people contracting coronavirus during that time.
-with files from Tyler Orton/Business in Vancouver
