DOH prepares system, seeks volunteers in anticipation of COVID-19 vaccine

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As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to spread throughout the country and affect local communities, the Rhode Island Department of Health is preparing to enable a Medical Emergency Distribution System for whenever a vaccine is created to help curb the disease.

Part of the MEDS program would also be establishing a Points of Dispensing plan, which would assign local buildings to station these MEDS programs and serve the community by administering the vaccine.

“The Rhode Island Department of Health’s Medical Emergency Distribution System Program and its municipal partners is responsible for planning for and executing the mass dispensing of medical countermeasures for public health emergencies. Each municipality in Rhode Island has a comprehensive MEDS Points of Dispensing Plan that has been developed, exercised, and refined over many years. Mass dispensing of any medical countermeasure requires a huge amount of coordination and manpower, especially for local municipalities who rely on a combination of municipal staff and volunteers to work at the designated PODs where the public would receive these medical countermeasures,” said Joseph Wendelken, the RI Department of Health’s Public Information Officer.

RIDOH is hosting online training sessions via Zoom for volunteers. These training sessions take prospective volunteers through what these PODS would look like when activated and how they would function. Volunteers need not have a medical background to become involved, as there are many roles to be filled in the PODS.

Whether it be helping with parking, guiding patients through the building and correct lines, helping fill out basic medical paperwork, and many other duties, there are ways for everyone to help.

“Currently, RIDOH is offering a virtual training on MEDS/PODs to help recruit potential volunteers and familiarize them with how these PODs function. There is a role for everyone. Volunteers do not have to have a medical background, and all interested Rhode Islanders are encouraged to volunteer if they are able to,” said Wendelken.

“If there is a vaccine that comes, we need to find a place to dispense them, and right now we are looking at the high schools to set up. We need many, many volunteers. Even for things like showing you where to park, what line to get in. When you get in line you’ll have to fill out a basic medical history form and we’ll have volunteers helping with that. They’ll also separate people with disabilities and people without disabilities. Then you’ll go to an area to receive the vaccine which will be distributed by medical people, then later be put in an observation room just to see if there’s a reaction,” added Paula Ducharme, wellness nurse at the Pilgrim Senior Center who has participated in the virtual training sessions.

Ducharme urges locals to get involved, regardless of background, to help prepare the state for when the vaccine is hopefully created.

“This is extremely important for our community. This is a big community and you want people vaccinated out there,” said Ducharme. “People are going to be reluctant to receive the vaccine, it’s going to take some time, but I feel that the more education we get out there about it in the public, it will help. The more people we have volunteering in the community, they will be educated. It’s scary, it’s all unknown. But the more volunteers we have, the better it will be.”

The schedule for these online trainings is available at: https://tinyurl.com/yxylgyg6 and updated weekly every Sunday with the sessions for that week. If anyone has specific questions about the program or training they should reach out to Travis Vendetti, the Assistant Medical Countermeasures Program Director, at travis.vendetti@health.ri.gov.

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