Dozens of eligible people wait hours for monkeypox vaccine at Encino pop-up clinic
Health officials with the Los Angeles County are working to distribute all of its monkeypox vaccines to those eligible by the end of the week, with dozens of people waiting several hours at an Encino pop-up clinic for their shot.
"I've been waiting for four hours. No, no, five hours," Simon Miler, a resident of Bel Air, told CBSLA.
Miller was one of several people who lined up early and waited for hours to get the monkeypox vaccine on Thursday.
The Encino pop-up clinic is one of four sites the county health department set up as part of a push to get some 4,000 shots into arms by Sunday.
While some of the people waiting did not want to speak on camera, they said the wait was tough, but that nothing would deter them from getting vaccinated.
"In order to process people, it has to be done by an actual nurse," Miller said, "and there's only four nurses here. So, that's the problem. I think that what they could do to make it quicker is give each nurse an assistant."
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there are now more than 4,600 confirmed cases of monkeypox in the United States. In LA County, there are 279 reported cases, all reported by men, and the number continues to climb.
Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra announced Thursday that the department will distribute 786,000 new doses of the vaccine, with priority going to areas with the greatest number of people at risk.
"Bottom line is we need to stay ahead of this and be able to end this outbreak," Becerra said.
County officials said those eligible to get the monkeypox vaccine include people who had contact with someone who contracted the virus, as well as LGBTQ men who were diagnosed with a sexually transmitted disease in the last year or on HIV prep or those with multiple partners.
Monkeypox spreads by skin to skin contact and although its primarily impacted men who have sex with other men, anyone can contract the virus.
"It can disfigure your skin, it leaves scars. It will knock you off...you'll be on your back for two weeks," Miller said.
Officials at the health department did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the long lines Thursday. The pop-up vaccine clinic at the Balboa Sports Complex runs again on Friday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.