BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) — Kern County supervisors are set to decide Tuesday whether to fund a mobile vaccination clinic.
If approved, the county will partner with the Adventist Health Medical Center in Tehachapi with the goal of vaccinating roughly 80 people per day, or 560 per week, in east Kern communities like Mojave, California City, Rosamond, and Boron.
Supporters, including Kern County Administrative Officer Ryan Alsop, hope supervisors approve the plan, arguing a mobile clinic will help accelerate Kern’s vaccination effort, enabling the county to administer hundreds of additional shots per week in areas where people otherwise may not have access.
“We are gearing up and setting up to vaccinate as many people as we possibly can in the shortest amount of time,” Alsop said.
Adventist Health Partnership Executive Kiyoshi Tomono said the plan will help ensure equity and inclusivity in the vaccination process.
“In a lot of these areas…there’s a scarcity of all kinds of resources, and that includes the ability to get into a car,” Tomono said. “Some of these folks don’t have the ability to pay for a car or bus stop, so our goal is to bring the vaccination out to them,” he continued.
Alsop said the effort would not take from limited county vaccine supplies. Instead, he said, the proposed agreement with Adventist Health would increase the total vaccine doses available in kern.
“This is adding to our supplies, which is the most extraordinary factor of this proposal,” Alsop stated.
If approved, the goal is to get the clinic up and running by February 15th. Leaders with the county and Adventist Health say they hope to get similar clinics in the valley in the coming weeks.
“Wellness and the wellbeing of our community is defined by everybody being well. Our community is not well until everybody is well,” Tomono concluded.
