Ferris has announced that this coming week there will be a COVID-19 vaccination clinic on the Ferris campus available to members of the University community.
Joy Pulsifer, Dean of Student Life, explained that the University has received 2,490 first dose vaccines for students, faculty, staff and other campus community members. The vaccine clinics will take place inside the Jim Wink Arena Monday through Thursday, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The clinics will begin on Monday, April 5.
“We plan to vaccinate 14 people every 10 minutes, 84 people per hour and 588 people per day using seven stations,” the email from Pulsifer said.
Lindsay Barber is the Director of Ferris State University’s Birkam Health Center and Personal Counseling Center. She has been instrumental in getting vaccines for the Ferris community.
“This is the first shot of a 2-dose series so anyone who schedules an appointment for next week will automatically be signed up for that same time slot 3 weeks later,” Barber said.
Barber further explained that back in the fall the Birkam Center applied to be a vaccine distributor with the state and then in January was approved to receive the vaccine when it became available.
Barber noted that throughout the spring semester, there have been weekly meetings with the District 10 Health Department in order to prepare to host a vaccine clinic when the vaccines became available. On Wednesday, when Birkam got word of the 2,490 Pfizer vaccines coming they knew the University was fully prepared.
“Birkam Health Center along with members of the College of Pharmacy, College of Health Professions, and many other areas of campus immediately jumped to action and began to ‘hit play’ on the action plan we have spent all spring designing,” Barber said.
Barber said Birkam and the University hope this will be the first of many vaccine clinics held on campus.
Michael Klepser is a pharmacy professor at Ferris who specializes in infectious diseases and point of care diagnostics. He’s been involved with of COVID-19 testing and precautions on campus since the pandemic began.
He has seen some of the fear and apprehension surrounding getting the vaccines and hopes to dispel that.
“These vaccines are safe, they’re effective. Even though there are some side effects, they’re generally manageable and the side effects are just essentially those that indicate that the vaccine is effective,” Klepser said.
To sign up for a vaccination appointment next week go to: https://ferris.medicatconnect.com. If you’re interested in volunteering at the vaccination clinic, check out the sign-up genius page here: 10c0d4da8ab2aa6fbc43-clinic.