Vaccination clinic to open at Devonshire Mall, 2 other Windsor sites to close

Windsor is getting a new COVID-19 vaccination site as of next month, as officials make plans to close twoexisting sites.

The new mass vaccination clinic will be operating out of the southwestern Ontario city's Devonshire Mall, at the former Sears location,as of June 21, officials announcedFriday.

Windsor Hall, which is owned by the University of Windsor, and the St. Clair College Sportsplex will no longer be vaccination sites, effective June 19 and July 22, respectively.

The closures will allow the buildings to be used by those institutions in time for the fall semester, according to ajoint news release from Windsor Regional Hospital, the Windsor-Essex County Health Unit, the City of Windsor and the property management company for the mall,Cushman & Wakefield Asset Services Canada.

Anyone with a prebooked second dose appointment between July 11 and 21 at Windsor Hall will be rebooked at Devonshire Mall.

Windsor Regional Hospital President David Musyj said hewished thatmass vaccinations could have been completed before it became necessary toswitch to another site.

"I wish we had sufficient vaccines in Canada that we could get the campaign done in a lot less than a year," he said, adding that that's why he is continuingto push for access toexpiring vaccines from across the border.

Downtown site to shut down

According to Musyj, sites other thanDevonshire Mallwere considered but there are few spaces that fit the bill, since an accessible space with a large capacity is required.

The closure of Windsor Hall, located at167 Ferry St.,means the downtown core will be left without amass vaccination site, with the closest clinicbeing the Moy Medical Center on Ottawa Street.

Currently, the downtown areawhere postal codes start withN9Ahas the lowest vaccination rate among seven provincially designated "hot spot" communities in Windsor-Essex.

According to WECHU data released Friday, thevaccine coverage rate is42.8 per cent in theN9A area while theregional average is53.6 per cent.

Musyj said hehopes that many people will have had theirsecond doseby the time the downtown clinic is set to shut down.

There's also the possibility of doing apop-up clinicif necessary, Musyj said

"We'll play that out and see where it goes, if there's complications," he said.

Free transportation to vaccine clinics is already available through Transit Windsor, as well as via taxi through an initiative with the Windsor-Essex Regional Chamber of Commerce.

There are four other vaccination sites in Windsor-Essex that will continue operating:

• Moy Medical Center.
• WFCU Centre.
• Nature Fresh Farms Recreation Centre in Leamington.
• Libro Credit Union Centre in Amherstburg.

Vaccinationsare also available at some pharmacies and select primary-care providers' offices.