By Alison Steinbach, Stephanie Innes | Arizona Republic
Almost 30,000 vaccine appointments are still available for the week ahead at state-supported sites, a surplus that would have been hard to imagine just a few weeks ago.
At a state COVID-19 vaccine site that opened Monday at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, 81% of this week’s appointments through Sundaywere still available as of midday Monday.
At the state-operated site at the Yuma Civic Center, 73% of this week’s appointments were still open, and at the state site at the University of Arizona in Tucson, 66% of the week’s appointment slots were unfilled.
Overall, nearly two-thirdsof the appointments at state sites released Friday for the week ahead remained available Monday, according to numbers provided by the state health department.
Between appointments posted online and through the call center, about 28,100 appointments were still open midday Monday of the about 44,100 made available Friday.
Earlier in the vaccine rollout, all the week’s appointments would get booked within minutes or hours of their release.
All eight of the mass vaccination sites offered by the state health department had availability for the week, with some of the new and soon-to-open sites showing thousands of unbooked appointments.
Those who have been delaying appointments to wait out the rush will now find it much easier to book a slot at a site in the Phoenix metro area, Tucson, Yuma or Flagstaff. The state sites use the Pfizer vaccine, which is the only vaccine currently-approved for those ages 16 and 17.
Here’s the approximate breakdown of the appointments through Sunday that are still available online and at the call center as of midday Monday:
