BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KERO) — Kern County Public Health officials said ever since July fourth they have continued to see an increase in vaccinations across the county and as of Sunday, 51% of Kern County’s eligible population has been fully vaccinated.
Tuesday, Kern County Public Health is opening a vaccination clinic at the Kern County Fairgrounds to continue getting the eligible population vaccinated, and if you want you can also get your flu vaccine at the clinic.
“Vaccination is the safest, fastest, most effective way we can develop immunity against COVID-19, as we start to see a decline in our COVID-19 cases here in Kern County, we encourage our unvaccinated residents to get vaccinated to help us prevent the 4th surge,” said Brynn Carrigan Public Health Director, Kern County Public Health Department.
Carrigan said the goal of this vaccination site is to help with booster shots and the potential vaccine for children ages 5 to 11.
“Kern’s 5 to 11 population is estimated to be 99,526 people,” said Carrigan. “In order to ensure sufficient capacity for the vaccine booster and for the likely upcoming authorization of vaccination in 5-to-11-year old’s, our department is relaunching a scaled-down mass vaccination clinic at the fairgrounds.”
That site is in the Harvest Hall and they hope to vaccinate around 100 people per day, Tom Beckett, Technology Services Manager, Kern County Public Health Department explained how it works.
“After they’re registered, they’ll come to the line and wait here for the vaccination stations at my left to be available,” said Beckett. “Once there’s an opening, they’ll be ushered to one of the open vaccination spots where one of our nurses will administer the COVID-19 vaccine and the flu vaccine if they so have chosen.”
After receiving the COVID vaccine EMT staff will be stationed to monitor those who received the vaccination in case of complications.
Carrigan said their partnership with the fairgrounds continues to allow them to vaccinate Kern County residents.
“We vaccinated over 100 thousand people through the fairgrounds which was phenomenal and without the fairgrounds, we would not have had the ability to vaccinate so many people in a small period of time,” said Carrigan.
The clinic will be open through the rest of the year, you can get the vaccine Tuesday through Friday from 10:30 a.m to 6 p.m at the fairgrounds.