COVID Vaccination Info
We will keep this webpage up-to-date on information regarding the COVID vaccine and eligibility of our local veterinary community. Please let us know if you have any specific questions that we can help answer. Your MCVMA officers are working hard to contact public health and CVMA officials to advocate on your behalf to receive the vaccine.
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We are urging all veterinarians and staff in SLO County to contact the SLO Dept of Public Health here and request that our profession be made a priority in receiving the COVID vaccine and moved to Phase 1A. We have been providing essential services throughout the pandemic, putting ourselves, staff, and families at risk.
On January 13, 2021 the following email was sent to one of our board members in response to her letter:
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"Thank you for taking the time to share your concerns with us. I hear you, and want to acknowledge the frustration and disappointment you and your colleagues are feeling as a result of the information we provided yesterday. I agree that this is a very stressful time and we genuinely meant no disrespect to the veterinary community in our communications. We wholeheartedly acknowledge and appreciate the work you are doing and how essential it is to our community.
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We also agree that veterinarians are an important part of our essential work force and should be vaccinated before the general public. Due to our very limited supply of vaccine in this county, we are allocating our vaccine supply based on the guidelines recommended by CDPH, which does not include veterinarians under Phase 1a at this time. I empathize sincerely with your frustration and disappointment. It‘s true that veterinarians are listed under the health care sector of the State’s Essential Workforce list that was published in March 2020. However, we are not using that essential workforce list to determine the order in which people are vaccinated. Instead we are following the CDPH guidelines linked above. As a result, veterinary professionals will most likely be eligible for vaccine in Phase 1c of our local vaccine plan, maybe even sooner.
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In the future, we will work directly with the Mid Coast Veterinary Medical Association to share information with the veterinary community as we get it. In the meantime, you can also find the latest information about when and where different groups can get vaccinated in SLO County here: https://www.recoverslo.org/en/when-and-where-can-you-get-vaccinated.aspx. The information is currently very limited, but we are building it out over time and expect to add more details in the coming days and weeks.
Thank you for your perspective on this matter—our goal is always to communicate as effectively, truthfully, and respectfully as possible with the tools we have. We meant no insult to the veterinary community, and are overwhelming grateful for the essential work you and your colleagues do every single day."
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As of January 12, 2021, SLO County does not consider veterinarians eligible for the COVID vaccine. We have been notified the County is classifying veterinarians as Phase 1C. This goes against information released from the CVMA on January 8, 2021, announcing the statewide designation of veterinarians in Phase 1A (see our designation on the California COVID website here - under Healthcare, see Item 21). The SLO County Department of Public Health sent out the following notice:
