Mar 31, 2021 3 min read

Volunteers using a Pittsburgh area Facebook group have been helping scores of people secure appointments for a COVID-19 vaccine.

Laura Magone of Monongahela said she’s been using the group “Getting Pittsburgh Vaccinated – COVID-19 Appointment Tip Page” to help hundreds of mostly technically challenged older adults get doses over the past two months.

“It breaks my heart,” Magone said Tuesday.

She said she turned to the group after vaccinations became available to find out how her family could get an appointment for them.

The process was frustrating many people, she said, and it was similar to going online to find concert tickets.

“I’m still hearing from people with concerns. There’s definitely a problem,” Magone said.

Group members gather limited personal information from those seeking a vaccine to register them at pharmacies, and they alert each other when appointments open up. The appointments typically fill up quickly.

Two months ago, she was fielding about 20 requests a day, a number that had dropped to two on Tuesday.

“I’ll do it as long as there is a need,” Magone said.

The slowdown in requests to the Facebook group comes at a time when there is growing hope that most Americans will be eligible for a vaccine by April 19.

In neighboring Fayette County, the registry established by the county’s task force has run out of names and has approached state officials seeking permission to move into the 1B designation. Those in the 1B phase include food and agricultural workers, U.S. postal workers, clergy and manufacturing workers. A full listing of those eligible in all phases can be found on health.pa.gov.

“It’s incredible that we’re at a point where just between Uniontown and Highlands hospitals alone, I think they’ve given 26,000 vaccinations – and that doesn’t include our partner pharmacies and Centerville Clinics,” Muriel Nuttall said.

Nuttall, co-chair of the task force and executive director of the Fayette Chamber of Commerce, said it’s important for those in the 1B and 1C categories to sign up on the registry at fayettecountypa.org now to keep the process moving forward.

“We have 4,100 doses coming next week for the two large clinics,” she noted.

Until the county gets the go-ahead from the state, however, they must limit vaccines to the 1A phase only, Nuttall said.

Gov. Tom Wolf on Tuesday visited a mass vaccination site in Dauphin County that is expected to distribute 2,800 vaccines this week, doubling what it did the week prior.

“We continue to make great strides in administering vaccinations in Pennsylvania,” Wolf stated in a news release.

New cases of the virus continued to grow Tuesday in Pennsylvania, where 5,032 new cases were announced that day.

The virus has killed 25,049 residents of the state in the past year after 34 new deaths were reported, none of which occurred in Washington, Greene or Fayette counties.

Washington County reported 87 new cases, taking its cumulative total to 15,034. The case-counts in both Fayette and Greene each grew by 22, taking their totals to 11,174 and 2,854, respectively.

Jennifer Garofalo contributed to this story.