Eligible Ottawans travel to Kingston area to get COVID-19 vaccine

People from the Ottawa area who are ages 60 to 64 are travelling to the Kingston, Ont., region to get vaccinated againstCOVID-19.

The Ontario governmentlaunched a pilot program on Fridayinvolving 325 pharmacies offering doses in select regions, inToronto, Windsor, and Kingston, Frontenac, Lennox & Addington(KFL&A).

• Eligible Ontarians can get a vaccine in a pharmacy, even if living outside of participating regions
• 3 Ontario regions to pilot COVID-19 vaccines at some pharmacies

You don't need to be living in those regionsto get vaccinated.

Pharmacies are setto administer 194,500 doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, which the province gained access to last week.

Bryan McLean, 62, who lives in Ottawa, saidhe wasn't sure if he would be eligible, so he called a pharmacy in Sharbot Lake, about an hour and a half drive away.

We know that this isn't over until everybody is vaccinated.- Bryan McLean, 62

"Told them we were in Ottawa and [asked] were weeligible or not, and they said, 'Absolutely you are, come on down,' so we booked it and we went down on Saturday, and it was fantastic," said McLean.

He said there was no lineup, and he and his wife, who is also eligible, were in and out in 10 minutes.

"On the one hand, it feels great, on the other hand, we know that this isn't over until everybody is vaccinated, so it's sort of, you know, it's a step along the road in the right direction."

McLean said that within minutes of leaving the pharmacy, he receivedan email with all the information about the vaccine. It also informed him he would be contacted about when he get his second dose.

Tim Dooley, 60, who lives in Manotick,was vaccinated on Sunday in Amherstview, which is in the Greater Kingston area.

"I was actually feeling a little bit guilty that I might be taking somebody's shot from the Kingston area, so the first question I asked the pharmacy was, 'Is that a problem if I'm coming from Ottawa?' And they said, 'No, not at all,'" said Dooley.

He said the experience was easy and organized.

"It was a big relief. I got to say, I was a little nervous before I had the shot, but afterwards it was a relief, and I just hope it it keeps going, and more and more people get vaccinated."

Dooley said he knows about a dozen friends whoare thinking about getting vaccinated at a pharmacy.

"After I spoke to them at the pharmacy, the messaging was clear. As I said, I was a little concerned about travelling to Kingston to get the shot. But I mean, the messaging was pretty clear that it was for anybody in Ontario."

Dooley works in sales and said he hasn't seen a customer in personin about a year, so he's excited to see more people getting vaccinated.

Booking outside region up to pharmacies

Aakash Patel, the pharmacy manager at the Shoppers Drug Mart in Amherstview, said thatat first itwas only offering to vaccinatelocals, but then opened the service to anyone.

"Most of the people are from local [area], like I would say, about 80 per cent are local and 20 per cent are from outside the region," said Patel.

Kingston, Frontenac and Lennox & Addington Public Health said in an emailed statement there are no restrictions on travelling in the province to get a vaccine, but it does not recommend it.

"KFL&A Public Health do not recommend travel outside your region, especially if your region or the region you are travelling to have a higher incidence of COVID-19 or are under lockdown," the statement said. "There are no provincial restrictions of travelling to different areas to receive vaccine. It is the decision of the individual pharmacy to choose if they would allow appointments from those outside our region."