MARION (WSIL) -- The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs now says the veterans they serve will be some of the first to receive the coronavirus vaccine.
The VA is expected to provide vaccines to front-line workers and Veterans who live in long-term care units in 37 of its medical centers across the country.
The Marion VA Medical Center says they are not giving out vaccines yet, but they are already preparing a clinic for veterans.
After The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs announced last week
vaccine distributions will be given out, the Marion Marion VA Medical Center says they received an influx of calls.
"I think it's great, the interest that we are seeing from our Veteran population. I--starting Thursday after the FDA approved the Pfizer vaccine, the next day we received at least 50 calls from Veterans that wanted to get the vaccine," said hospital deputy nurse executive Donna House.
Marion VA was not on the initial recipient list, but House says veterans do not need to call them because they've been working on creating priority groups for the past month.
"We have pulled all of our patients in our catchment area, which is 40-some-odd-thousand. And we have started contacting those that were listed as a high priority," she said.
The Chief of Pharmacy says they will be ready for whenever they receive their shipment.
"We should get 48 hour notice in advance that it will be arriving. Someone will be here on station waiting for it. We will have everything ready to receive it and place it in our cold storage," said Kevin McCree.
And while the hospital waits, they are making waiting rooms for veterans to get their vaccine.
"My goal, and Kevin and I have been working to do 100 to 200 vaccines a day, whenever we get a full shipment, but we don't know for sure how much we'll get at first, but we're making preparations for the future so we can be sure to get to every veteran that's interested," said House.
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