BATON ROUGE, La. – It’s been a tough month in the race to vaccinate the masses at the Bon Carre Mass Vaccination site in Baton Rouge.
“I expected to see a traffic jam, but I didn’t,” said vaccine patient, Natasha Thomas.
A four week average showed about 143 shots were given a day, but the mass site has the capacity to do 3,000 shots a day. The low turnout is a worrying trend for Thomas who just got her first dose.
“Maybe the world could open back up if everyone came on over and got vaccinated,” she said.
In East Baton Rouge, 32.52 percent of the population is fully vaccinated.
In Louisiana, it’s only about 29 percent of that metric.
But even with low demand the mass vaccine site remains open, giving people the option to get the shot without having to leave their car.
“This big site here has the capacity for a large number of people. It’s going to take time because some people have this hidden agenda that they don’t want to take it,” said vaccine patient, Gregory Thomas.
Some are expecting turnout to pick up this week as eligibility for Pfizer’s vaccine expands to children 12 and up.
“A lot of time and effort has been put forth over there, so I’m hoping that they would come out and bring their children as well,” said vaccine patient, Rebecca Ferguson.
With or without the federal site, vaccine distributors still have a lofty vaccination goal of 50 percent in East Baton Rouge Parish.
