Vaccination #1
April 17th - I got my first covid-19 vaccine (Pfizer) at Levi’s 49ers stadium in Santa Clara. My wife and our daughter also got their vaccine today. Our son already received his first covid-19 vaccine a few weeks earlier.
I was only intending to make this post public much later. Many of my family and acquaintances around the world do not have access yet to a vaccine. It feels first-world-showoffy. Yet, nobody really reads my microblog.
I had feared that once they allowed everybody older than 16 to get the vaccine, that there would be a huge rush to the vaccination centra in the Bay Area. On April 15th, in Santa Clara county alone, one million more people became eligible. At a rate of 25,000 vaccines per day, it could take a bit. I was not in a rush. Luckily, my wife was able to secure an appointment fairly quickly.
The vaccination site at Levi’s Stadium is very well run. There is plenty of parking, obviously. After completing initial forms while queuing, you are ushered into an area where they validate your registration, your identity and insurance information. This is all by barcode and image scanner and only takes a few minutes. You then go upstairs where there are a large set of vaccination stations. Lights indicate to the ushers which stations have an open spot, so they can move it along. After the shot, a follow-up appointment three weeks later for the second shot is scheduled right then and there. You are asked to wait 15 minutes in a recovery area to ensure there are no immediate negative side effects. Within 45 minutes or so, we were in and out. That’s not counting taking some cool pictures with the stadium as the backdrop.
I didn’t experience any negative effects, beyond a little soreness in my shoulder in the evening.