Tarrant County officials want to expand access to COVID-19 vaccine

A partnership in Tarrant County is taking the COVID-19 vaccine and registration help where it’s needed.

On Tuesday, the mobile clinic was in a west Fort Worth community.

"One of the reasons we came here to the Las Vegas Trail area is there are folks here who don’t have the transportation resources to get to some of the vaccine distribution sites," said Brian Byrd.

The clinic got underway just as Tarrant County commissioners discussed more ways to reach underserved communities and overcome challenges like language barriers.

"Now luckily a lot of our Vietnamese community does speak English well. The sign-up rate is actually pretty good, eight percent Asian. Vaccination rate is pretty good, but again we can’t have that gap," said Vinny Taneja, Tarrant County Health Director.

Expanding access to the vaccine is a growing topic for Tarrant County leaders.

"What concerns me is we don’t have anything west of 35 in Tarrant County," said Judge Glen Whitley. "When it comes down to it, we don’t have anything west of 35 as far as a vaccine distribution."

Whitley says adding distribution locations is a priority and it underscores the need to finalize an agreement with UNT to handle logistics -- which is now delayed.

"We’ve got to be ready at a moment’s notice to take a double or triple number of the vaccine we are getting," Whitley said.

He pointed to Denton County, which received more than 32,000 doses this week and began vaccinating a thousand people an hour on Tuesday at Texas Motor Speedway.

Whitley says he wants Tarrant County’s comprehensive plan to handle sites and volunteers on a grand scale, like TMS.

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