Sigh. NSM on that vaccine and other crappy news

[nwhiker]

Well, crap.

NSM on that vaccine. Turns out to have been crossed wires: someone posted something (twitter and reddit) saying that everyone was eligible at the FEMA clinic in Yakima, so I went and got appointments. I did not lie on anything and they registered us.

Well, upon further inspection, what happened is that the State put everyone on the honor system, and some places appear to have removed their eligibility GATE. For example, if I try to register at any site in King County, the first thing it asks me is to answer the eligibility questions, then it tells me to FOAD. Yakima removed theirs and clearly I -and plenty of other people- did not know it.

So now I have three appointments for Saturday that are not legit. I'm waiting to talk to dh, but I suspect we'll let them go and then on the 15th try to find a legit appointment somewhere. Can't do that now because... Yakima removed all their dates beyond the 15 April date at which the state opens up to the rest of us.

I am also starting to suspect that Washington's commitment to equitable distribution of vaccine has reached the point where it is actually hindering efficient distribution of vaccine. Before they took all the appointment down for the next 10 days, there were at least 600 appointments, up to a 1000 available every day in Yakima, and still 200 open for today. In the meanwhile, the only places King County has are clinics in South King County where you have to be a resident of the local area. We've done a pretty good job at reaching minorities and at risk population, but with the growth in case numbers, we need faster and literally, shots in arms.

It's been a stressful two days (AC: back at home, and she's dreadfully sad and her dipshit bf is still a dipshit who needs to 'take a break' while he works on his own mental health, Mom with either a bad lung infection or lung cancer. Her scan 4 months ago was clear, so fingers crossed it's "just" an infection, and I'm just stressed but waiting to panic until we have more info), and I've been crying since I realized this was not going to work out.

Yes, I could cheat. I'd hate myself for it. Just seems like a crappy week and I'm scared for my mom.

ETA. OK. Mom update. Pulmonologist thinks it's more likely pneumonia, the degree of growth since her last 100% clear CT scan would be very atypical of lung cancer. And it's right lung, which is where aspirational pneumonia tends to end up, and she's has that at least three times in the past 4-5 years. I'm not quite breathing a sigh of relief yet, but that update sounded better then the radiology report (which was released to my sister by mistake). Plan is a course of heavy duty abx, followed by a PET scan to see if things have resolved. Fingers crossed.

Comments

[camelsamba]

Here's my take on it: you have appointments in Yakima. Lots of other people do as well. The system is planning for that many doses to be administered on that day. If you don't get your shots, those doses might go to waste. It's going to be how many days ahead of the change? I understand you not wanting to break rules (it's why I was hesitant to follow up on a "contact this orthopedic hospital you've never heard of in the Detroit suburbs" tip a friend gave me a few weeks before we were eligible). But at this point, you followed the rules that were presented to you, so proceed.

I've mentioned that lots of people in southeast Michigan are headed to northeast Ohio because the Ohio folks don't want the shots so they're sitting in freezers waiting for arms. Maybe something similar is happening in Yakima. (And when I mentioned that to someone in Cincinnati, she told me some of her family drove to Indiana! So now I wonder if people in northeast Indiana are heading to southwest Michigan and we'll end up with a circle of vaccine seekers...)

[nwhiker]

I love the circle of seekers. Around here, it seems to be "200-300 unfilled appointments in Eastern Washington, not a single one available in Western Washington". Sigh.

We decided to keep the appointments. The site is run by FEMA and apparently they have their own rules, at least from what I can tell and they say anyone over 16, not other qualification. Everyone wants people in Western WA to stay in Western WA for vaccines, but they haven't even opened scheduling for anything. It's just a mess.

I've been monitoring the Yakima site and there are between 200-500 appointments unfilled every day, so I'm not feeling all that bad.

Thanks for the reality check. I feel guilty, but then I got pissed off that apparently 50% of my demographic is already vaccinated (or has had a first dose) and we're still not officially eligible. 50% of 40-50 year olds are not medical personel. :P

[camelsamba]

btw glad the news on your mom is on the more positive end! Does she have dementia? My sister told me that dementia can lead to swallowing issues (it did in our mom, leading to aspirational pneumonia more than once), although i wonder if they are connected or just co-incident (as in if you're old enough for one, the other is also likely to occur).

[nwhiker]

She does have dementia and I've heard about the link (or whatever sort it is) between that and swallowing issues as well. To add to the complexity, my mom has always had swallowing issues of one sort of another: she's had several procedures over the past decades to relieve strictures in her esophagus. No known causes (possibly inflammation from decades of smoking?) but it's been a long standing problem. Anyhow, I suspect both are contributing to the issues with swallowing.