Mayor Eric Garcetti announced at a press conference Thursday that Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles will begin as a mass vaccination site starting Friday morning.
The site, which the mayor referred to as “the largest vaccination site in the country,” would have the capacity to vaccinate 12,000 people every day. A full workforce has been deployed to administer vaccines, according to Garcetti.
“This vaccine is safe, this vaccine is safe,” he repeatedly stressed, urging residents to get the vaccine as soon as they become eligible.
“It is your civic duty when it is your turn to get this vaccine. It is an act of love for your citizen because it will save someone’s life or the lives of many people, and it is a step forward to reopen our schools and our economy.”
Who can get the vaccine: In Los Angeles County, the vaccine is currently only available to health care workers and seniors who live in nursing homes and skilled nursing facilities. While the county has nearly 1 million healthcare workers, Garcetti said about half of them have not received the vaccine yet.
“The bottom line is, we don’t have enough vaccines,” said Garcetti.
He also said that some sites may retain their vaccine assignment to deliver a second dose to healthcare workers.
With the opening of Dodger Stadium and five additional vaccination sites from the county, Garcetti said he expects hundreds of thousands of vaccinations every week.
What happens in Los Angeles County: The province recorded a total of 975,299 coronavirus cases and 13,234 deaths.
Hospitalization in the province continues to overwhelm hospitals and health care workers, and there are currently 7,906 people hospitalized with coronavirus – 21% of them in the intensive care unit.
Garcetti said that while there are early signs that hospitalization in the county may be stable, it is “not close to leaving the woods.”
