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Those sites are:
Nassau County:
- Temple Beth El of Great Neck on Old Mill Road from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Tuesday, April 6.
Suffolk County:
- Patchogue YMCA on West Main Street from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Tuesday, April 6, and Thursday, April 8;
- Unkechaug Tribal Nation at 151 Poospatuck Lane in Mastic from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. on Friday, April 2.
They are among 18 new community-based pop-up vaccination sites coming online at churches, community centers, public housing complexes, and cultural centers in downstate New York to “bolster the state’s commitment to ensuring fairness and equity in the vaccine distribution process.”
The sites are expected to vaccinate more than 8,500 people, with more sites expected to open up in the coming weeks. Since the community-based pop-up sites starting going online in January, more than 180 locations have vaccinated nearly 70,000 New Yorkers.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who received his Johnson & Johnson vaccine last month at a pop-up site in Harlem, said that the sites will be re-established in three weeks to administer the second doses to those who receive the first at the pop-up location.
"Our strategically placed pop-up sites have been invaluable in helping us reach New Yorkers living in vulnerable communities and to make the vaccine accessible to them," Cuomo said. "We will continue to work with trusted community leaders to address hesitancy around the vaccine and correct the injustice that poor communities suffered when COVID ambushed our state.
"The vaccine works, and we will use every tool at our disposal to make sure Black and Brown New Yorkers are not left behind in the distribution process."
The pop-up sites receive a limited amount of the vaccine, which is earmarked for certain members of the community, officials noted.
"We are continuing to set up community-based pop-up sites across our state because we remain committed to making sure the vaccine is accessible for all New Yorkers," Cuomo said. "These sites have allowed us to reach our hard-hit communities and to address the skepticism around the vaccine, and they have been instrumental in making the vaccine distribution more equitable."
Vaccination sites are also planned for all 33 NYCHA Senior Housing Developments, and at more than 300 churches and cultural centers that volunteered to house the sites.
“COVID brought the ugly truth of inequity and inequality in this country to a tipping point," Cuomo said. "COVID has killed Black and Latino New Yorkers at a higher rate and that is why these community-based sites are one of New York's vaccine priorities.
“The light at the end of the tunnel is bright and getting brighter with each new location and each shot administered."
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