Vaccine clinics across British Columbia are offering doses of COVID-19 vaccine without an appointment on Wednesday.
Twenty-thousand doses are available for “Walk-in Wednesday” as part of the province’s push to get more people vaccinated.
Everyone age 12 and up is eligible to receive their first dose while a second dose is available to those vaccinated before June 16.
Clinics will administer either Pfizer or Moderna vaccine.
No reservation is needed. People can show up with a piece of photo ID and an immunization card if they have one.
Some clinics will offer live music while a clinic in Kamloops will have a therapy dog on hand to comfort people who are anxious about getting immunized.
A list of drop-in clinics is available at the Vax for BC website.
The province said Tuesday that 81.4 per cent of eligible people aged 12 and older have received a first dose of COVID-19 vaccine while 67.3 per cent have received two doses.
Health officials say vaccinations are more important than ever as B.C. sees another spike in COVID-19 cases.
The province on Tuesday reported 742 new cases over a four-day span. There are now more than 1,500 active cases in the province, the majority of which are in the Interior Health region.
The Delta variant is behind rising case counts in the Central Okanagan where heightened restrictions are now in place.
Henry said the upward trend in COVID-19 cases is not unexpected.
“We knew that as more people travelled, more people got together, that the virus was still here and this is part of us learning to live with it,” Henry said. “But we also have this really important tool now that we know is very effective, and that’s vaccination.”
Henry wanted to assure those who have taken a wait-and-see approach to immunization that COVID-19 vaccines have proven to be safe.
“We now see from evidence of millions of people here in the U.S. and Canada and around the world that they work and they’re safe,” she said. “So those are the things that we need to get the message out. I’ve heard from friends and colleagues who said, ‘Well, you know, we don’t know the long-term side effects,’ but we actually do know a lot about these vaccines and these types of vaccines and how safe they actually are.”