California and the federal goverment have teamed up to pilot two new mass vaccination sites, part of a wider effort to open 100 such locations in 100 days across the U.S.
Parking lots on the Cal State University campus in Los Angeles and the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum were filled with trailers and tents Tuesday. Operations at the sites are being run by the Federal Emergency Management Agency in conjunction with the California Governor's Office of Emergency Services and the California National Guard.
To receive a vaccination at one of the locations, people must first sign up for an appointment on the MyTurn.ca.gov website. The sites are open between 9 a.m. and 7 p.m. seven days a week for at least the next eight weeks.
Both sites have the capacity to vaccinate up to 6,000 people per day, including drive-thru appointments. But Gov. Gavin Newsom said on Tuesday that only about half that many are currently available. “Supply is the issue. That’s the constraint,” he said.
Two of the state’s other large vaccination sites, Moscone Center in San Francisco and Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, had to temporarily close recently when supply dwindled. But Newsom says it still makes sense to build out the state's vaccine infrastructure, so that it's ready when the supplies start to flow.
California had administered almost 6.3 million vaccine doses as of Monday.