By Eva Hill
hilleva@grinnell.edu
Grinnell College announced today that it will be offering the two-dose Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine to anyone affiliated with the College and currently living in or around Grinnell. The clinic will take place on April 7th and April 8th in Darby Gym in the Bear Athletic Center, with follow-up doses to be given on April 28th and April 29th. Sign-ups close this coming Saturday, April 3, at noon CST (detailed instructions on how and where to sign up can be found in the announcement email sent out by Harris this evening).
There will be over 1,100 vaccines available, and doses will go first to students and College employees before being distributed more widely, depending on dose availability. If students or staff have already been vaccinated, they can register for a second dose through the College clinic.
Harris told The S&B that part of the purpose of the College-run clinic will be to lighten the appointment demand on local vaccine providers, including the Hy-Vee supermarket in Grinnell and the Grinnell Regional Medical Center. She emphasized that the College’s goal is to help distribute vaccines to as many people as possible as quickly as possible.
The College is conducting the clinic in partnership with Hy-Vee, which has been holding vaccination clinics in locations across Iowa and other states. The College clinic will use the HyVee signup system (linked above) for scheduling. Of the partnership, Harris said, “I really see the power of relationships and the power of being alert to possibilities in this ability to have a vaccination clinic.”
It is unclear how many doses will be needed for the initial round of vaccinations, where only students and College employees will be eligible, especially as many students and College employees have already begun receiving vaccines. The College hopes to have as much of the campus community vaccinated as possible.
The state of Iowa will open up vaccine eligibility to all people over the age of 16 on April 5, although some areas have already started offering vaccines to the general public. The vaccine rollout in Iowa has been criticized for disorganization stemming from Governor Kim Reynolds’ decentralized rollout plan, which has caused confusion to the point that an independent programmer created a Twitter bot to notify Iowans of places in the state with available vaccine appointments as they’re made available.
