Focus Shifts To Younger, Hesitant, Busy Coloradans In Next COVID Vaccine Push

DENVER (CBS4)- The state is tasked with making sure younger Coloradans, anyone with hesitancies, or those who are just too busy to get a COVID shot, take the next step and get vaccinated. The plan is to make getting a shot nearly effortless.

The City of Denver is considering allowing walk-in traffic for all their community vaccination clinics around the city. That means no registration or appointment necessary. The city says it's just one way of reducing barriers as they address vaccine hesitancy in the community.

The Denver Department of Public Health and Environment is doubling down on efforts to distribute vaccines.

"The more people that get vaccinated, the harder it is for the virus to find people to infect," said Bob McDonald, Executive Director of DDPHE. "We need to think about different strategies, and we're doing that right now, not just doing away with registration requirements, but expanding on hours, and even more so now, looking at how can we set up opportunities to get vaccines where people are going anyways."

McDonald says it's about meeting people where they are.

"Certainly, grocery stores because everybody goes there, but there are other retail outlets that maybe cater to the younger age groups where we're seeing a little bit more hesitancy, or at least just not lining up to get vaccinated as quickly as others," McDonald said.

Vaccine equity in underserved areas also remains a priority.

"Some of it comes down to really educating people and understanding, 'Why is it that you are hesitant to taking the vaccine? Is it that you think you won't need it? You don't believe in the serious complications from COVID-19?'" said McDonald.

DDPHE says it's all about finding new ways to push the message and protect the community.

"The more people that we have that are not vaccinated, the more infections we have, the more infections we have, the more it mutates, and the more it mutates, the more we run the risk of the current vaccines no longer working," said McDonald.