People 60 and older will be able to get COVID-19 vaccines without prior appointments at 16 mass vaccination sites across New York State, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced this afternoon.
There are two sites on Long Island where walk-up appointments for seniors will be available: SUNY/Old Westbury and Suffolk Suffolk County Community College in Brentwood. The walk-up appointments will be available beginning Friday.
Older people have had difficulty making appointments online, Cuomo said. Walk-up appointments are intended to make it easier for them.
The state will set aside a vaccine allocation to facilitate this expanded vaccination access, the governor said. There may be a wait for people opting to walk-in at some sites, depending on demand, he said.
“Given the location of those sites, walk-up doesn’t seem to be the problem,” Southold Supervisor Scott Russell said.
The median age in the Town of Southold is 55.4, nearly one-and-a-half times higher than the median age in Suffolk County, 41.3— and the state overall, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
“This is yet another example of the East End getting ignored,” Russell said.
Early on, East End supervisors fought to get any vaccine distribution sites on the twin forks at all. Several vaccination sites have since opened on the East End: at the eastern campus of Suffolk County Community College in Northampton; at Stony Brook Southampton Hospital in Southampton, Stony Brook Eastern Long Island Hospital in Greenport and at Peconic Bay Medical Center in Riverhead. Vaccines are also available at certain chain pharmacies and at the Sun River Health clinic at the county center in Riverside.
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Brentwood is located in Islip Town, which has the lowest median age — 39 — of any town in Suffolk. Its neighboring towns, Babylon and Brookhaven, where the median age is 40, have the next lowest median age in Suffolk.
Statewide, more than 5.8 million people have completed their vaccine series and nearly 8.5 million have gotten at least one dose.
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