Department of Health to pilot vaccination program at Vado Speedway

The New Mexico Department of Health (NMDOH) is partnering with the Doña Ana County-City of Las Cruces Office of Emergency Management (OEM) and Vado Speedway owner Royal Jones to begin using the speedway, 15900 Stern Drive in Vado, as a COVID-19 vaccination site.

Dawn Sanchez, southwest region director of the NMDOH Public Health Division in Las Cruces, said a pilot vaccination program will take place at the speedway by appointment only, 10 a.m.-noon, Monday, March 29.

“Royal had contacted me offering the speedway as a site for vaccinations,” Sanchez said. “It’s been a good partnership with Mr. Jones,” she said.

NMDOH will begin with a “slow roll” at the speedway, Sanchez said, probably administering about 300 vaccinations that first day, as NMDOH determines its staffing needs for the site and when it would be available.

If all goes well at the speedway, it could expand to a “big site,” Sanchez said, and ramp up to perhaps 3,000 vaccinations a day, depending on the availability of the vaccine.

Overall, vaccination administration is going smoothly in Doña Ana County, Sanchez said, and the county is receiving its fair share of the vaccine.

When the vaccine first became available in early February, she said, some providers in other parts of New Mexico ordered large doses, but Doña Ana County has been catching up, she said.

“We are fully supplied with vaccine,” Sanchez said. “We have more than our typical allotment,” which she said NMDOH distributes based on population. The county should be entitled to about 10,000 doses a week, Sanchez said, but has been receiving 12,000-16,000 doses weekly.

And, while there is a limited supply of vaccine statewide, “they have been allocating large amounts to our area,” she said. “The state has very consciously focused on pushing more vaccine in our county.”

An NMDOH spreadsheet shows the county received 6,125 doses of vaccine (Pfizer and Moderna) Feb. 4, and with the addition of the Janssen Pharmaceuticals Companies of Johnson & Johnson vaccine in late February, the county received almost 17,500 doses of vaccine Feb. 25, 11,690 doses March 4 and 12,590 doses March 11. In addition, Sanchez said some area pharmacies are receiving their own, separate allotments of vaccine through a federal program.

In addition to Vado Speedway, Sanchez said NMDOH has developed important partnerships to deliver the vaccine in southern Doña Ana County with Gadsden Independent School District (GISD) and La Clinica de Familia.

“They’ve been just tremendous partners,” Sanchez said about GISD, which she said has set up vaccination sites at its high schools in Anthony, Chaparral and Santa Teresa.

Visit https://cv.nmhealth.org/covid-vaccine/

 to register for the vaccine. Also visit https://cvvaccine.nmhealth.org/public-dashboard.html.