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Not so long ago, Portlanders faced heavy competition to make vaccine appointments.
But fresh evidence emerged Sunday that the demand for vaccines in Portland may no longer exceed supply.
As of Sunday evening, appointments for a prime dose were available at the Oregon Convention Center—the state’s largest mass vaccination site—for as soon as Tuesday, May 4. (Sign up for them here.) Until recently, the appointments were only available by lottery.
Related: Oregon’s Largest Vaccination Site is a Logistical Masterpiece. We Take You Inside.
Oregon Health & Science University also had appointments at its PDX drive-thru clinic for as soon as Thursday. (Sign up here.) Until recently, those appointments disappeared within a half-hour of being posted.
“Our scheduling website isn’t experiencing a rush of visitors on weekday mornings this week, as was the case in previous weeks,” OHSU spokesperson Franny White emailed this week. “We suspect this might be due to an expanding number of vaccination options being available statewide....To be clear, thousands of new OHSU vaccination appointments are still being booked every weekday. The only thing that’s changed is that newly released appointments aren’t being booked within an hour of being released as they were before, and we want to encourage more people to sign up.”
And some pharmacies had appointments as well, including the Health Mart in Southeast. You can find those at getmyvaccine.org.
As of last Wednesday, Oregon Health Authority officials said the state was continuing to administer doses at a relatively steady rate, driven by demand in the metro area while demand fell sharply in some other areas of the state.
In Multnomah County, 48% of residents have received at least one dose, according to OHA data. Only three counties had a higher vaccination rate: Upward of 50% of residents of Lincoln, Benton and Hood River counties had received at least one dose.